SERIES: Beyond the Veil

TITLE: 3 – A Beautiful Dawn

AUTHOR: Scorpio

FANDOM: Harry Potter/Buffy the Vampire Slayer (Multi)

RATING: PG (Varies)

SUMMARY: Sirius Black meets the person who captured him. They chat.

Beyond the Veil 3 – A Beautiful Dawn

"Mr. Black?" A young woman with long straight brown hair and the most amazing eyes he had ever seen peeked around the privacy curtain pulled up around his bed. She seemed vaguely familiar, but he couldn't remember why. He smiled up at her and she smiled back.

"Please, call me Sirius. Mr. Black was my father and a more churlish lout you'd never find."

The woman's smile softened a bit, a flash of sadness in her eyes. Nodding her head, she stepped up next to his bed and sat down on the chair stationed there.

"Deal. I'm Dawn Summers, by the way."

"Charmed. A lovely name for a beautiful woman. It suits you."

Her eyes widened slightly and then she flashed him a brilliant smile even as she almost seemed to be laughing at him. "Oh, you're a flirt, I see. I'll have to keep that in mind."

Sirius wiggled his fingers at her from where his hands were cuffed to the bed. "I'd shake your hand, but…" his voice trailed off hopefully.

Her smile dimmed then and she became serious as she leaned back in her chair and crossed her legs. "I'm sorry. That's not up to me." She blushed lightly and frowned. "I know that Willow spoke to you briefly earlier when you first woke up. Do you remember what you two talked about?"

An image of the pretty red haired witch rose up in his mind and he had to actively work to keep it from morphing into a vision of Lily Potter.

"Yes. She explained my arrival here from her point of view. She said that I just appeared out of nowhere and that I was subdued as an invader. Once captured, everyone realized that I had injuries and wounds that couldn't be explained. So, they brought me here to the infirmary and healed everything that they could in the hopes that I could explain what had happened."

Dawn nodded her head in agreement and then gave a short little wince and shrugged apologetically. "Uh… I'm actually the one that captured you. I sorta kicked you in the head and knocked you out. Sorry about that, but it was pretty scary. I was down in the artifact storage area looking for something when all these alarms started blaring out about an intruder. When I ran around the corner you were kneeling down and pointing a stick at me. I thought it was a weapon, so…" Another apologetic little shrug. "Sorry."

Sirius could feel the faint throb from the fading bruise on his temple and grimaced. His head still hurt even though they had given him some muggle potion to help the pain. "That's okay. I understand. I probably would have done something similar if I had been in your place.

Dawn nodded and shifted in her chair slightly. "So… can you tell me a little about how you got here? You weren't able to tell Willow much before you drifted back off to sleep. The only thing she really learned was that the big spell-burn on your chest was from a curse and that you had been in the middle of a magical battle. No real details though. You were pretty out of it."

Sirius leaned back on his mound of pillows that were propping him up and thought back to what happened before he woke up in this half-muggle half-magical hospital. Images and sounds flashing in his head, he tried to explain something he only half understood.

"We were in the Department of Mysteries at the Ministry. There were several of us and we were trying to stop Vol-Voldemort from getting his hands on Harry or the Prophecy. My cousin Bellatrix was there, insane and evil as ever. We were dueling." Memories rose up in his mind; Bellatrix's hate filled face, his taunting laughter, Harry's horror and fear. "I messed up. I got arrogant and sloppy and she took advantage of that. She hit me with a pain curse right in the chest."

Sirius glanced at his bandaged chest, the echoed memory of pain skittering down his spine. Glancing over at Dawn, he saw understanding and sympathy without pity.

"I fell. I didn't hit the ground though. At the time, I thought that I had fallen through The Veil, but that's not possible. It leads to the Realm of Death… and this place isn't it."

An odd look flickered across Dawn's beautiful face, her eyes lighting up with an intensity that made him catch his breath.

"This Veil thingy… is it a big stone arch way with a thin tattered looking curtain hanging from it?"

Sirius blinked in surprise. "Yes, actually. How did you…"

"That's it!" Dawn shouted even as she popped up out of her chair. "That's what you fell through. We have one of those things down in the artifact storage room, but we didn't know what it was so we left it alone." Turning on her heel, she began to pace along the length of his bed. "Giles needs to know this. We have to research it and figure out how that Veil thingy really works. If it sent you here, maybe it can send you home!"

Sirius blinked. Then he blinked some more. Finally, in a strangled whisper filled with hope he asked, "I might be able to get back to my godson Harry?"

End: A Beautiful Dawn