Disclaimer: Not mine.

The Uninvited

Chapter 3

The next morning the newest and only patient in the hospital wing awoke while it was still dark and the fading of the sky from black to violet was just showing on the horizon. With one hand placed on her still sore ribs, she pushed against her side to hold in the pain and struggled to sit on the edge of the bed. She took in a deep breath, surprised at the way her throat opened clearly, then shook her head at the realization that just the simple removal of a magical collar had already made her feel so much better. Even when her body had been wracked with pain, the collar had preoccupied her mind. She had always found restraints and bindings more painful than other sorts of humiliations and that sign of slavery strapped to her throat was no exception.

Putting both hands to her neck, she smiled at not just the absence of any collar but also the absence of being controlled. Realizing with a start that her hands were both able to flex and move with only a little soreness she smiled at her good fortune of making it somewhere that had a Healer. She remembered the snapping of her thighbone and pressed her hand to her leg to see if it offered residual pain. Finding little more than a general tenderness she stretched out her feet testing their flexibility.

Placing her hands on the mattress, her legs already hanging off the bed, she twisted first one way and then the other assessing any damage to her back. She remembered collapsing to on the ground and being unable to move for several minutes when she had arrived. Unsure if this was caused by her leg, back or mental condition she was hesitant to stand, but she slowly pulled herself up and only to feel herself swept by a wave of dizziness. After a couple of moments that also passed as she closed her eyes and tried to clear her mind.

She looked around for something to put on over the hospital gown that she was wearing but saw nothing she could use. Remembering that her wand had been snapped the evening before, ruling out transfiguration, she scowled as she looked in the small cabinet beside the bed hoping to find something useful for her flight to freedom. She found only reading material and a hand mirror left by a previous patient. She needed a replacement wand, and she needed to find one now.

Peeking out from the curtained bed area, she observed a large hospital room. She saw a door to the right, and correctly assumed that it went out into the main part of the school. Turning left, she headed to what appeared to be a door to a room in the back. Moving towards it, she hoped she could find something she could use or at least locate a rear entrance to the ward.

A short dumpy Medi-Witch sat with her head on her desk sound asleep. The witch smiled remembering the wizard who had found her, and how he had reassured her that he was sending for help. This must be the one he talked of, she thought. She wished that she could thank her, but instead she walked in as quietly as possible and took the wand lying next to the witch. Backing out of the office, she searched for evidence of another door.

Seeing nothing that would indicate another way to escape, she knew she would have to face the main hallway. Creeping back to the bed she had used, she grabbed the pillowcases off the pillows to and transfigured herself a dress and robes. She looked around the floor for something to use for shoes, until she at last found two worn slippers under the third bed down the row. Using the stolen wand, she turned them into the boots that she would need if she made it back to the forest.

Feeling underdressed, but knowing knickers and bra would rub against the newly forming scars, she pulled up her hood and headed towards the door. She hoped that the Medi-Witch did not have wards set in the almost empty school as she did not want to be pursued in an unfamiliar place, when she did not know where to run.

The doors opened to a dimly lit hallway that stretched as far as she could see. Knowing she would be highly visible in such a long corridor, she sought a different escape route. She walked close to the wall, trying to keep her back flat against it. Coming to a winding staircase, she decided to go down to a lower level and try to find a hallway that connected with the one above. She drew out the wand and tried to cast a do not discover me spell but to no avail. The Medi-Witch's wand worked for small spells, but she found it too sluggish and much too slow for anything as complicated as she needed.

Cursing under her breath, she started down, stooping to peer down the stairs ahead of her, and taking only a few stairs before checking again. At each level, she ventured back to the main corridor running under and parallel to the one above it, and each time she found no way out. She continued down twisting with the stairs until there was no longer a main corridor in sight. It was cold here and damp. She knew she was in the dungeons. If these dungeons were like any other, she knew that they would be rife with escape routes. She just had to find one and then pray it was not being watched.

Poppy woke up with a startle when she found herself at her desk, taking a few seconds for it to register where she was and why she had stayed so late into the night. She stood, stretched and reached for her wand, sighing when it was not where she had left it. Lowering to her still sore knees and peering under the desk, she searched for a couple of minutes before using her chair to pull herself back up. Opening her desk drawer to take up her diagnostic wand, she cursed herself for falling asleep.

The wand that was missing had limited capabilities but it still angered her that someone had taken it. She used as little magic as possible in this area of the infirmary due to the stock of potions kept on hand in her private cabinet. Severus had schooled her several times on the effect of magic on potions and given her the weaker wand, telling her to leave her own behind. Now her real wand laid four stories and two towers away.

Walking down the aisle toward the witch's bed, she noticed the curtain pulled aside. She was puzzled until she pulled it back the rest of the way and found the bed empty and the pillows stripped. Putting this new information together with the knowledge of her missing wand, she pulled her diagnostic wand and hoping it worked, sent her Patronus to Severus.

Severus had just entered his shower. He stood in the hot water, letting it flow down his back. Lifting his face to the spray he sighed deeply, longing to just once to be able to go back to sleep. He knew that even if he crawled back into bed, pulled the pillow over his head and silenced the whole castle, he would not be able to sleep. Once he woke, his sleep was over.

He considered anything over four hours of sleep a boon. He had slept for ten. Extra sleep made him feel tired and sluggish, and only a long shower would help. Then he would need a pot of hot strong tea. He finished drying and headed for the floo. Wrapping a towel around his waist and dropping to the floor on his knees he was just set to order from the kitchen when Poppy's Patronus came.

He listened as it told him the witch was missing. Missing with Poppy's wand was more the problem. They had no control over an adult leaving against their wishes but could not let her leave with a wand registered to Poppy.

Severus advised the Patronus to return to Poppy and assure her that he would help comb the castle. She could not have gone far. None of the wards had sounded so he knew she was still somewhere in the miles of corridors, and hundreds of rooms. He could eliminate the grounds from his search, as well as the password-protected dormitories, but everywhere else would have to be inspected.

He had examined less than half the dungeons when Albus and Minerva came hurrying down the passageway to him.

"Severus, we have just heard from Poppy. There is a strange witch on the loose in Hogwarts. Do you have any idea who she is?" Minerva asked excitedly.

"No I do not," he sneered, his wand still working at tracking recent activity. "Albus, it is much easier to determine a magical field if they are not disturbed. I would suggest that you and Minerva either search elsewhere or retire to your office until the witch is found."

"You are quite right, lad," Albus said. "However, until the young witch is found, I am afraid I must insist on that any search party to work in pairs. Minerva will be with you, I am to join Poppy."

"It is a witch Albus, not the Dark Lord."

"She is in the castle. I will not take any chances," Albus frowned.

"I see. Now that the students are gone we need to be careful."

"Severus," Minerva chided him with the tone of her voice.

Severus and Minerva worked different sides of the passage, methodically moving towards the end nearest the east wall. Suddenly Minerva stopped and waved Severus over.

He verified the magical trace and examined it closely. He could identify almost all of the staff's signatures, and the students' would be much weaker than this. The trace that Minerva had found he had seen before, in the middle of a field at a Revel, and in the Forbidden Forest.

They continued down the hallway casting tracing spells at doors and recesses along the way. Then, when there was only one alcove between them and the door, he knew they had found her.

Pushing Minerva behind him, he approached the alcove slowly.

"Witch, I have no idea why you are running. However, you may leave whenever you wish. This is not a prison. I would suggest that you leave the wand behind if you don't want me to follow you. I assure you, I will not stop you. You have my word on that."

He heard the sound of wood sliding over the floor towards him. Pointing down the hallway, he cast a simple Alohomora opening the outer door and bathing the floor in sunlight.

The witch, looking smaller now in the light, lifted her hand to shield her eyes as she stood in front of him briefly, before she turned and ran for the door.

"Stupefy," he shouted, pointing his wand at her.

Walking over to her prone body, he stood and looked down at her with his arms crossed on his chest.

"So I lied," he sneered, flicking his wand over her, enabling her to speak.

"Bastard!" she hissed up to him.

"Professor McGonagall you may want to advise the others that the witch is found," he snickered. "I have missed breakfast, again, and I plan on eating lunch."