A/N: Alright, sorry for the delay, I've ran out of prewritten chapters so posting will be pretty slow until I can get an all writting weekend (second week of March I think). This one is decent sized...I think. A little more insight to Alana's family life and what goes on with her and her cousins, which is just an appetizer because next chapter is FULL of insider's info to the life of a teenaged Taestai. I'm working on weaving a few of my other ideas into the plot but it's proving to be quite difficult and makes my brain freeze up. That's when I got to my back-burner story, which I might eventually post as a once in a while thing. Now, enjoy the show!

P.S.: It belongs to someone who has actually got a creative gene in their body and can write pretty well. Hence, anything you recognize doesn't belong to me.

Chapter 23: The Hospital Wing Revisited

Everything hurt. Why? She didn't know, it just did. Much more than when she had fallen asleep. And that was another thing, why was she asleep? There were no nightmares...so maybe she was cured! No, that didn't sound right. She wouldn't feel so...fluffy if she was cured, so light-headed. She lifted her eyelids slowly, they were very heavy and dry for some reason, and tried to see where she was. The hospital wing swam in front of her eyes for a few moments as she tried to fight falling back to sleep again.

"Hello?" She called out groggily, "Anyone here?"

"Of course someone's here." said a voice from behind her, "It's never fun to be alone in the hospital wing. Believe me, I've been here more often than anyone should be allowed."

"That's because you're an unstable child Harry." She turned to face him and saw all three of her close friends standing around her. "Maybe it's just me but that's definitely the vibe I've been getting off you since I met you. What do you guys think?"

"Well yeah. He's the only one who can manage to loose all the bones in an arm when playing Quidditch." Ron laughed.

"That wasn't my fault!" Harry shot back defensively. "It was that dolt Lockhart. He should be kicked out of being a wizard. He has no idea what the hell he's doing..."

"He's not that horrible. In fact, after loosing his memory he was pretty adorable." Hermione said matter-of-factly. Why she said it in that tone no one knows.

"That's because you fancied him" Ron said teasingly. "And I bet you still do."

"Oh come off it. I couldn't after what he did to you two."

"But if he hadn't you would."

"No."

"Hermione and Lockhart sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G."

"Stop acting like a two year old Ron."

"It's better than acting like a two hundred year old."

"I do not act like I'm two hundred!"

"Yes you do."

"I don't!"

"Ah...Young love." Alana sighed all of a sudden. Hermione and Ron stopped their bickering at once and glared at her in horror.

"Urgh!" They exclaimed in unison, taking a step back from one another. "That's disgusting!"

"How could you even say something like that?" Hermione asked, a little more flustered than usual.

"Yeah I, uh, I just finished eating lunch." Ron stammered, turning furiously red.

"Just saying what I know." Alana sighed again. "Now help a girl out of bed and-"

"Oh no you don't!"

Alana nearly growled in frustration as Madame Pomphrey scurried her way across the Infirmary to her bedside.

"You must be insane to think you're leaving! And why are you awake? I gave you a dreamless sleeping potion not two hours ago. You should be fast asleep for another four hours!" She was bustling about Alana, checking her heartbeat with a peculiar looking stethoscope, sticking a thermometer in her mouth and breaking up a large chunk of chocolate with her tiny hammer.

"No wonder I'm so tired." Alana said in amazement. "That stuff works wonders, do you think I could get some for the road?" Madame Pomphrey only stared at her in horror.

"Certainly not! This isn't something you should be playing around with." She touched the cold stethoscope to Alana's back and listened carefully. "You should only use it when you have dire need."

I think nightmares that look worse than any massacre the Deatheaters could come up with qualifies. Alana thought discontentedly. And It would be appreciated even if it only works for a few hours at a time.

"So Ms. Lucas, mind telling me what happened?" Pomphrey asked seriously as she poured some steaming potion into a goblet on the bedside. "Mr. Weasley tells me you fainted."

"I did? I mean, I did, yes, I fainted...I think..."

"What do you mean 'you think'?"

"I don't really...remember, exactly."

The nurse glared at her disbelievingly and made a sound like she was unwillingly accepting Alana's words. She obviously had her misgivings.

"Well, you seem to be in good health. You have a bit of a bump on your head that should be gone in a few days. Now I want you to eat your lunch here, without getting out of bed, and when you leave, you are to go directly to your common room and stay in bed for the entire night and for the first two classes of the day tomorrow. Understood?"

Alana begrudgingly agreed and nodded her head in assent, along with a healthy role of her eyes.

"I'm counting on you three to make sure she does it, too. And check in on her whenever you can, to make sure she's still in bed."

Harry, Hermione and Ron all nodded as well, with their fingers crossed behind their backs of course. It wasn't like they were going to force her to do something she didn't want to, but Hermione was definitely going to scold her if she didn't at least stay on the sofa in the common room. None of them really wanted her to get hurt.

"Hmm... You still look a little off..." Madame Pomphrey mumbled, almost to herself.

"Mm, o 'eah," Alana said all of a sudden through her mouthful of bread. She swallowed and continued, "I was supposed to come and get something for a cold before I, uh, fainted."

Madame Pomphrey gave her a piercing look before sedately strolling to the vast glass cabinet filled with many vials and potion bottles that she used day to day to treat the strange and numerous injuries and illness that befell Hogwarts students.

"I'm not sure you should get a pepper-up potion, you don't seem ill enough and it can have wildly disastrous, if only temporary, effects on one's mental state when taken with no particular need." She searched through the shelves for her target and finally spotted it all the way in the back. "I think it best to take it all in one swallow. It'll burn but I think it'll perk you up just fine." She passed Alana the small vial of amber coloured fluid and stood over her as she uncorked it and tilted it to her lips.

Alana pulled a face and thrust the glass bottle back into Madame Pomphrey's ready hands. Seconds later she started coughing and sputtering with the surprising bite of the concoction.

"'Tis a bit stronger than I usually take my drink but I do feel a little more awake." Alana said as she cleared her throat rather loudly. "Do you make a habit of giving your patients whiskey as a treatment?"

"I avoid it at all costs actually." The nurse said as she handed Alana a glass of water. "But not many students come for cures for mild colds in compromised states. You looked like a strong girl though, I thought you could handle it."

"You gave her fire whiskey?" Ron asked indignantly, but with a mischievous glint in his eyes . "You know Madame Pomphrey, I'm not feeling too well." He clutched his stomach for dramatic effect.

"Mr. Weasley, under no circumstances will you get any such substance from this infirmary and certainly none as strong as blaze whiskey."

"Blaze Whiskey! You gave her Blaze whiskey?"

"She has a much higher tolerance for alcohol than yourself Mr. Weasley."

"That's not a normal medicine is it?"

"Certainly not. It is a highly unorthodox home remedy that Ms. Lucas is most likely used to considering where she is from." the nurse said bitterly. "Now if you would please escort her back to your dorms I would greatly appreciate it." She turned on her heel and stalked into her office.

"Cranky old coot spoils everyone's fun." Ron muttered under his breath

"You shouldn't be drinking anyhow Ron." Hermione admonished. "You're still in school and you're a pre-"

"Yes, I'm a prefect and I should be setting examples. I know."

"No need to get testy."

"I'm not testy. You're just annoying."

Alana and Harry glanced at each other and tried to bite back their laughter, which really didn't work out too well. Hermione and Ron were still at each other's throats when Alana struck up a tune.

"Oh can you feel the love tonight?" She sang all out of the blue. Once again, the bickering couple stopped dead and glared at her with contempt.

"What?" She asked mock innocently, "Can't a girl sing a love song at random moments when two of her friends are fighting with each other in an effort to gain one another's affections?"

More blank looks

"Alright, guess not." She swung her legs out of the bed and stood up quickly. She gasped as soon as her feet touched the stone floor. It was pretty damn cold. "Do I have my shoes here? Please tell me I have shoes."

Hermione shuffled to get Alana's slippers and clothes and shooed the boys away from her bed so she could help Alana change into her robes. As she drew the curtain around them, she struck up a conversation.

"So, do you really drink whiskey at home?"

"Not usually. Like Madame Pomphrey said, it's really only a pepper upper sort of thing. That is unless you're one of the 'I must be macho' men. They think it shows they have balls when they can drink whiskey as if it were juice." she laughed lightly as she remembered the drinking games her cousins would play to prove how manly they were. The consequences were never pretty.

"That doesn't sound very healthy." Hermione commented concerned. Alana revelled in how maternal Hermione seemed even though she was only sixteen. She was a born Matriarch.

"Well, they usually spend a lot of the next day bonding with the toilet bowl." Hermione looked slightly appalled but laughed a little and helped Alana slid the uncomfortable hospital gown off.

"They haven't really realized that they can fix themselves up with the same potion women use to get rid of morning sickness." She rolled her eyes and sat on the bed to pull her jeans on. "But Dermot did tell me once that it has a tendency to give the guys a more feminine figure for a few days."

Alana changed into her clothes as quickly as she could, but she was still a little sore and had a horrid headache centred in her temples. She really just wanted to go to bed, in her own dorm of course, but she knew classes were the more responsible choice, even if Madame Pomphrey said she shouldn't go at all today. Lunch had just started, so she could get in a good hour of sleep before she, Hermione, Ron, and Harry had to head to Transfiguration. She followed them to the Great Hall and grabbed a glass of pumpkin juice before running off to Gryffindor Tower.

"Do you need one of us to come with you?" Hermione asked, she was trying to sound like a concerned friend, which she was, but something told her that Alana was going to try to get to class against the nurse's orders.

"No, I'll be fine." She said coolly, "It's not like I'll pass out from going up the stairs or anything."

"You sure?" Hermione double-checked and Alana nodded her head, drained her glass, and left the hall.

"You think she's up to something." Ron said nonchalantly while serving himself some potato salad. He put a forkful in his mouth before looking up at Hermione.

"She's going to hurt herself." Hermione replied. "I can't help it if I don't want her to get sick or anything. Usually that's considered a good thing though." She gave Ron a look that clearly said 'just you try and prove me wrong' and picked a sandwich up off a plate in front of her.

"Would you two stop worrying about her?" Harry asked frustratedly, as he poured some tomato soup in his bowl, "She's been through a lot and she'll be to whatever her normal self is eventually. She just took on a load of Deatheaters, survived a massacre, and watched her last constant contact with anything resembling a family die. She's going to act a little strange."

Ron and Hermione stared at him. They knew what she had been through and everything and they expected her to act oddly but things kind of fit together when it was said out loud, especially by Harry. He and Alana had a lot in common, they just didn't know it, nor did their friend expect them to ever figure it out. Not that they meant to be cruel or anything but Harry wasn't exactly the most logical of all people. He was gifted, none could deny that, and he was brave, he was just a little rash and close-minded sometimes.

xXx

Alana slowly made her way through the corridors that lead to Gryffindor Tower. As much as she hated to admit it, every step she took drained her more and more until she could think of nothing she would like more to do than take Madame Pomphrey's advice and sleep the rest of the day. She shuffled her way through the portrait hole and passed the few students that had preferred to study than attend lunch. It took much more effort that it should have to climb the stairs to the girl's dormitory and made her feel like she was suffering from the flu and pneumonia at the same time. Just as she was starting to contemplate the idea that the nurse had assigned someone to spike the punch with a sleeping draught, Alana felt a burning in the back of her throat. Before she knew it, she was bent double over the porcelain toilet seat and retching her guts out.

Eventually, there was nothing to cough up and she dry heaved until she was certain she could stand up without passing out and still feeling ill, she brushed the taste of vomit out of her mouth and lumbered her way to her armoire so she could change into something a little less suffocating compared to her robes. She had to sit down on her bed so she wouldn't fall on the floor while removing her robes and after near ten minutes of work, managed to crawl into her soft bed.

It was official, Alana Lucas was actually physically ill for the first time in eleven years.

A/N: Any questions? If you've got them, you've got to review because I am not a mind reader. I do, however, know everything about what's going on in the story because I'm writing it and therefore I am the best person to ask questions of about the story. Forgive the bad grammar. I'm dead tired and can barely form a sentance.

Hasta Luego!