Love of mine,

Someday you will die

But I'll be close behind

I'll follow you into the dark

No blinding lights

Or tunnels to gates of white

Just our hands clasped so tight

Waiting for the hint of a spark

-I Will Follow You Into The Dark; Death Cab for Cutie

CHAPTER 18

ALBUS POTTER

Rose now lay in the hospital wing. She'd been unconscious for a day and a half. The cut on her lip had been healed almost immediately by Madam Pomfrey but the bruise on her temple and her head wound were apparently more serious.

"I don't fucking care if they're more serious! You can mend broken fucking bones for fuck sake! You can grow them fucking back! Help her!" I'd screamed at the matron, who didn't seem to care how many expletives I used on her.

"Mr Potter, I appreciate that you are concerned for your cousin," She'd replied calmly, wrapping a bandage around Rose's head, "But there is nothing to be done right now. All we can do now is wait for Miss Weasley to wake up."

I kicked the wall in frustration, nearly tearing my hair out. It was my fault. I know it was. If I'd just got there sooner, if I'd realised what was happening sooner. My dad would've done it. My dad would've been there. If it was Ron or Hermione he would've been able to save them. So why couldn't I?

At that moment, Scorpius and Dominique came bursting into the hospital wing. If the situation wasn't this bad I would've marvelled at the fact that they came in together. Instead, I told them what had happened – well, what I knew anyway – and that we couldn't do anything about it yet. Scorpius kicked the wall just as I had. Dominique was almost in tears, obviously believing it was her fault.

"But, I don't understand, how did she fall? I mean, why did she fall? We all know Rose doesn't run,"

"Damn straight…" I muttered.

"So there's no danger of her tripping after running down the stairs…"

"I didn't hear any other footsteps apart from the… er… when she fell. It wasn't like she was running. I think she fell right from the top." My voice trailed off as all three of us thought about the two possibilities left to us, neither of them good.

"So either someone pushed her, or she did it herself…" Dominique voiced the combined thought we were all having.

"Rose wouldn't do–" I said, trying to reassure myself of that fact, but then my eyes landed on Scorpius and I thought of how different Rose had been for the past few weeks. We didn't know what Rose would do anymore.

"All we know now," Scorpius said quietly, his face turned away from us. He blamed himself for this. "Is that Rose is the only one who knows what really happened, and she's uncon–" He cleared his throat. "She's asleep. So all we can do is ask her when she wakes up."

Dominique and I nodded in agreement, taking a place by Rose's side as Scorpius stayed by the window. Almost as if they were waiting for us to finish our conversation, James, Fred, Hugo, and Lily burst through the doors of the hospital wing and crowded around her bed, all of them firing questions all at once.

"What happened?"

"Is she okay?"

"What the fuck?"

"When is she going to wake up?"

"Will she be okay?"

"What the fuck?"

"Are mom and dad coming?"

"Why isn't she healed yet?"

"WHAT. THE. FUCK?"

If it was any other time I would've been amused at my brother's lack of questions other than "what the fuck?" but instead I just glared at him. I let Dominique explain, I was too tired.

"Only six visitors at a time!" Madam Pomfrey came running out of her office to scold us for there being one too many of us. Immediately we all started to protest.

"Oh come on, can't you make an exception? Just this once?"

"She needs all the people who care about her right now!"

"I'll go." Scorpius said, surprising everyone.

"Scorp, mate, you don't have to…"

"She should be with her family right now. And I expect if she does wake up soon, my face will not be one she wants to see." And with that, he walked out of the door. The rest of us stood there in stunned silence until–

"What was that all about?" Hugo sat with his arms crossed and his lip pouting. I swear, he might be fourteen but he acted about six. Always crying to mummy and daddy when Rose didn't tell him something. It was so goddamn annoying. He might be family, but he was still fucking irritating.

"Rose is in love with Malf– Scorpius, Scorpius is in love with Rose, get over it." Dominique said in a bored tone, making a half smile play across my lips.

"Ewwwwwww!" He squealed, forcing James to put a silencing charm on him. Hugo didn't seem to notice at first, and then he realised that when he opened his mouth no sound was coming out. He sat down on a chair and pouted huffily at James, who sniggered at him. It almost felt wrong to be laughing while Rose sat next to me, unconscious, but I knew Rose would've laughed too so I wasn't bothered about it too much.

She stirred slightly, and the rest of us fell silent so quickly you would've thought James had put silencing charms on all of us. She started to murmur in her sleep.

"Dear fucking God, she's fucking sleep-talking." I said, slightly amused.

"Scorpius… Scorpius…" She mumbled, a dreamy smile fluttering across her face. Then quickly her brow furrowed and she turned from side to side frantically, scaring the hell out of all of us. "Lysander! Please don't do this!" She murmured louder, panic flashing on her face. Her eyes opened fully, but she seemed to still be asleep. Her irises moved crazily, moving side to side and up and down but never seeing us. She was still sleeping. How was she still sleeping?

"Madam Pomfrey! Pomfrey!" Someone finally had the sense to call for the matron, and a small part of the back of my brain was slightly surprised that it was Fred. I would've thought it'd be me or James. Then Pomfrey rushed out of her office, running towards Rose. In her hand she carried a bottle which I could just make out the word 'dreamless'. She quickly poured the potion into Rose's mouth. Nothing happened for a moment or two, and then Rose's eyelids began to droop again, but not before she saw all of us for the first time.

"What…?" And then she fell into a dreamless sleep.

Dominique looked up at me and I knew we were both thinking the same thing. We were gonna fuck Scamander up, and we needed Scorpius.

XXXXX

We left the hospital wing almost immediately, saying something lame about Rose's parents being here soon and that there was only allowed 'six visitors' at a time. They seemed to buy it, but if I knew James there would be questions later.

Immediately after Dom and I had entered the common room and shooed some first-years away from our seats, we began discussing Scamander.

"What the hell do you think that was?" Dominique said as soon as we sat down.

"I have no idea. It was either something left from when they were going out or something… recent."

"My guess is recent. And it's got to be something to do with Scorpius."

"Er, how'd you get there?"

"Well, Scorpius was what she was saying right before the Lysander part, right? And its obvious Lysander thinks she's been all not-Rose because he thinks she's choosing between him and Scorpius."

"That's fucking retarded, how the hell did you come up with that?"

"Well, he, er, told me." Dom said sheepishly. I ignored the fact that she didn't tell me this because it was Rose who was at stake here and that was more important.

"Merlin, he's a fucking twat. I didn't know someone could be that much of a fucking dickhead."

"Yeah well, not much to be done about that one. What do we do?"

"We get Scorpius, we find Lysander, and we beat the fuck out of him until he tells us what he's done to Rose."

"Fantastic." She said, her mouth spreading into a mischievous and determined grin.

We leapt up from our seats instantly and went to go find Scorpius, and I knew exactly where he'd be – and not just because I had my dad's map with me. He'd be by the library. It's where he liked to go to think. I don't know why, but he did. And sure enough, when I looked down on the map and found his little dot, that's where he was. Just outside the library. Dominique rolled her eyes and we sprinted there. We got there in less than four minutes, which I was pretty pleased about. I caught my breath quickly – the advantage of being a Quidditch player – while Dominique stood gasping and clutching her side.

Scorpius looked up at us with bewilderment as we stood over him. I explained the whole story as Dominique was still wheezing, and by the end he was stood up, his face contorted with rage.

"Where is that mother fucking bastard?" His voice was dangerously low, and there was a spark in his eyes that told me the old Scorpius was returning. But this time, I knew the old Scorpius and I weren't gonna be enemies.

Scamander was in the bathroom, which couldn't be more perfect if we'd planned it. Now we could ambush him. We ran to where he was and I heard Dominique mutter,

"Oh great. More running." I smiled as I caught up to Scorpius, who was already miles ahead of me. Merlin, he did love her, didn't he?

We arrived outside the bathroom, Dom wheezing again. When she had caught her breath, we all charged in. Scamander was evidently about to leave the bathroom and was shocked to say the least when Scorpius and I lunged at him, our wands to his throat.

"Get the fuck off me, Malfoy!" He spat at Scorpius, and Dominique slapped him.

"What did you do to Rose?" I said into his ear, my voice as low as Scorpius' was.

"What? What are you talk–" Dom cut him off with another slap.

"What did you do to Rose?" She asked it now, pointing her own wand between his eyes.

"Just because she doesn't love him doesn't make it automatically my fault!"

"Er, well, actually, she does love him and when she's lying in the hospital wing and screams your name frantically trying to get you to stop doing whatever the hell it was you were doing, it kinda does make it your fault." Dominique said, not moving her wand in the slightest.

"Hey, don't blame me that the girl loves to scream my name." He put on the arrogant smirk that only Scorpius or I could pull off and this time Dominique didn't get to slap him, because Scorpius punched him. Right in the nose. Again. The look on Scamander's face was even funnier than the last time and I forced myself not to double up laughing again. But boy, it was hard.

"Don't ever speak about her like that again, you dirty obnoxious fucker." Scorpius kicked him in his shin and grabbed him by his hair and yanked it backwards. "Understood?"

"Just because you lost, mate. She didn't tell you she loved you, and I won. She will never be yours, and I've made sure of that!" As soon as he'd said it, he knew he'd said too much. Immediately, Dom, Scorp, and I caught on, but Dom voiced what we all were thinking.

"Rose wasn't ready to tell Scorpius that she loved him, at first. And then, I'm guessing she decided she was, and she went to go find Scorpius and tell him. But instead, she found you. And you threatened her with something so that she wouldn't tell Scorpius and that you would get her." She finished with a disgusted look crossing her pointed features and she spat at his feet. "You disgust me."

"So what about the stairs?" Scorpius asked, his face was a mask; empty and blank. But if you looked in his eyes you could see a glimmer of hope there. Now he knew that the girl he loved returned his feelings. Now he knew that Rose loved him too.

"Fate." Dom said immediately said. Scorpius and I turned to look at her.

"What?" We said in unison.

"Fate Brown. It's logical. Everyone knows how much Fate wants you, Scorpius, and now we know how much Scamander here wants Rose. So, when Rose 'leaves' Scorpius, Fate's there to pick up the pieces and he eventually falls in love with her while Scamander gets Rose."

"You know what, Dom? That's actually pretty smart." I said, nodding my head approvingly.

"Jeez, you act like I'm retarded or something. I am a Weasley, remember?"

"Exactly." Scorpius and I both smirked, again talking in unison.

"You have to stop doing that." Dom looked at us in annoyance. "So what do we do with this dickhead?" She'd barely got the sentence out when I punched him, knocking him out cold.

"He's good here for a while." I said, and Scorpius sniggered.

"Right. Okay. Now what do we do?" Dominique looked at us blankly, and she had a point. What were we supposed to do?

"We need to go see Rose." Scorpius said, the mask still up. Dom and I nodded and we headed out the door.

XXXXX

"Rose! Rose!" We ran towards the hospital wing, yelling for Rose as though it would wake her up. Ron and Hermione weren't in there yet, and it looked as though Pomfrey had sent the rest of the family out.

She lay peacefully, and Scorpius sat down beside her, lacing his fingers through hers. I braced myself for the sick feeling in my stomach but it didn't come. I was almost confused but I shook it off.

"Rose. My beautiful red Rose." He whispered to her. He lifted his wand out of his pocket and conjured up a single red rose and let go of her hand. He placed the rose in it in his place and turned and walked away. Damn, that bastard was smooth.

"Scorpius…" Rose mumbled, and I knew she was about to wake up. Almost instantaneously, Scorpius was at her side.

"I'm here. I'm always here."

"Promise?" She whispered, her eyes flickering open. She snaked her hand through Scorpius' and he smiled his little sappy smile.

"Always."

"Thankyou." She murmured, her hand clutching his hand tight. Her eyes lowered shut again, and her heavy breathing told us she'd fallen back asleep.

"I love you." Scorpius replied in a soft voice, kissing her forehead and standing up to leave her in peace, but her hand held on tightly to his, not allowing him to leave her.

"Stay." I said, making him jump. "Stay with her so she's not alone."

Scorpius nodded and turned back to Rose, sitting back down in the seat and holding her hand tightly.

Again, I realised the sick feeling in my stomach that I usually got wasn't there. I wondered about it for a moment and looking back at them I knew what it was. I no longer counted Scorpius has the boy I have a truce with, or my enemy. I counted him as my best friend. Looking at them, I realised how perfect this picture was.

Great, being a sappy git is contagious.

I grinned and I walked back up to Gryffindor Tower with Dominique. Everything was going to be okay. Everything.

AUTHOR'S NOTE

Soooooo? This chapter has a lot more in it than the previous one, and I'm hoping this has all made sense to you.
Okay, first up, I know some of you will be like "There's no way Lysander would do that". But if you say that, you don't really understand it. You see, Lysander knows that Rose is in love with Scorpius, but Lysander is in love with Rose. So if he got Rose to stay away from Scorpius for a bit while Fate swoops in and gets Scorpius, she would think that Scorpius didn't really love her and that she was better off with Lysander, who did. It is flawed logic, but that's the point. It wasn't going to work because Lysander didn't take into account the whole Fate pushing Rose down the stairs might make Scorp a bit angry. but yanoeeee.

Thankyou so much for your reviews, they make me smile:) There is only a few chapters left of this story, as I have said, and I hope you've enjoyed reading it as much as I've enjoyed writing it.

please review!

thanks guys!

beccasophX