Rachel spent all of Thursday in bed. She knew she should get up and pull herself back together but everything felt insurmountable. It was her fault that her aunt and uncle were dead and every time she thought about it she was overwhelmed with guilt. She could hear Severus sitting behind her - the sound of his quill scratching as he wrote, the rustle of parchment, the occasional heavy exhale.

Part of her wanted to tell him to go away and leave her alone, but another part of her was scared of what she might do on her own. She felt on the verge of completely freaking out and she wasn't sure what that was going to look like, but it felt like she was barely containing an explosion.

She sat up at lunch and dinner to drink one of her drinks when Severus prompted her, and got up once to use the toilet because the other option was peeing herself. When it felt late enough, she told him she wanted to be alone tonight because she knew that he hadn't slept. He left reluctantly, instructing her to wake him for anything, even if she just wanted company.

Rachel didn't intend to sleep. The chances that she would have a conversation with the Dark Lord were too high. She couldn't speak with him right now or she would freak out and that would lead to more people getting killed. She didn't feel particularly tired anyway. In between the periods of overwhelming guilt she mostly felt numb.

On Friday morning she drank another one of her drinks and told Severus that he should go teach his classes. She felt weird and detached, but also significantly less likely to freak out than yesterday. Severus told her that he didn't feel comfortable leaving her while she was bed bound, so she moved herself to the sofa and told him that she wanted some time alone.

He had reluctantly left to go teach and told her that he would be back for lunch but that she could come into his classroom if she needed him. Rachel had no intention of going into his classroom. She couldn't deal with other people right now. Not even her friends.

She felt waves of fear when she thought about her friends. If the Dark Lord was willing to kill her relatives, he was certainly willing to kill her friends too. The worst case scenario was no longer her being captured by Death Eaters, it was the Dark Lord and his Death Eaters coming into the school on a killing spree since they seemed to be able to get through wards. If they could get through the wards without alerting anyone, then it would be easy enough for them to disillusion themselves, come into the Great Hall during a meal, and start killing. She hoped the situation with the wards was more complicated than that, but she hadn't been able to bring herself to ask Severus.

It simultaneously felt like nothing had changed and yet everything had changed. The goal was still the same: defeat the Dark Lord as soon as possible. But it felt both more urgent and more impossible. If she had found the horcrux by now, then they could have dealt with the Dark Lord, and then her relatives and a lot of other people would still be alive. She simply didn't know how to find the horcrux faster. She thought about the last two years, ever since she'd learned of the prophecy, and tried to figure out what she could have done differently.

Not being abducted would have changed things significantly. She would have been ready to help find the horcruxes sooner if that hadn't happened. But, then again, they hadn't even known she could find horcruxes until a year ago. She couldn't think of anything she could have done to change Professor Dumbledore's timeline or to get the information about how many horcruxes there were sooner. And they still had that awful snake to deal with somehow. Rachel shuddered as she remembered the snake coiling around her aunt's body.

Her previous plan for dealing with the Dark Lord felt naive. There were definitely going to be Death Eaters there. They were going to need the Order and maybe the aurors to deal with this. She didn't know how she could keep Severus away from this in order to keep him alive. If this was how she reacted to her aunt and uncle dying, then she couldn't imagine living through Severus dying.

Rachel thought of Susan and the Weasleys. She'd known they'd been struggling, but she hadn't known it would feel like this either. The only good thing she could think about their situation was that they hadn't watched anyone be tortured or murdered.

Severus returned for lunch and Rachel sat up and drank another drink. When he left for his afternoon classes she laid down again and tried to figure out what she was going to do the next time she talked with the Dark Lord.

What she wanted was to stop playing his games. She'd much prefer to never speak to him again. That wasn't practical though. If she stopped speaking to him, he was going to wind up killing more people and revealing that they were speaking to each other. The guilt she felt about her relatives was already unbearable and she had only unintentionally led the Dark Lord to killing them. She couldn't live with the guilt of getting people killed through her purposeful inaction.

So she had to talk with the Dark Lord. She just needed to stay awake until she thought she could do it without completely losing it. Her two options were caffeine, which she knew she could get coffee from the House Elves through the floo, but not without Severus knowing what she was doing, or a Wideye Potion. The problem with the Wideye Potion was it was intended to counteract a Sleeping Potion and the side effects of taking it without a Sleeping Potion were generally not considered to be worth it. And she couldn't administer the Wideye Potion to herself after taking a Sleeping Potion. And she'd have to brew it in secret, which probably wasn't going to happen.

She'd just have to stay awake through force of will. She thought she could do that for at least a few days. Maybe she could take short thirty minute naps during the day when it was unlikely that the Dark Lord would be doing whatever it was he was doing to talk to her. She could check if he was busy and then sleep if he was.

Cautiously she reached out to the Dark Lord. He was occupied and she had the sense that he was writing or reading - she still couldn't tell those two apart. Deciding now was as good as any, especially since she'd wake when she heard Severus come in from his classes, Rachel conjured a blanket and curled up.

She was tired enough that she didn't have to meditate to fall asleep and she awoke with a jolt a short time later as she heard a door close and Severus' footsteps.

"I did not mean to wake you," he said.

"It's fine, I was mostly dozing," she said as she sat back up.

"Millie brought by your school work for when you are ready for it. There's no rush, your professors know that you are away on bereavement for a time. If you want you can take next week off and have the holiday to rest and recover before you return to classes," Severus said.

Rachel considered that. She knew she should do homework and go back to classes. She just wasn't at that point yet. "Maybe. I don't know yet."

"That's fine, we'll take this a day at a time. Millie also says that she and the rest of your friends are available through your two-way books if you want to speak with them without seeing them in person."

She nodded. She wasn't ready for that either. She hadn't even opened her school bag.

"Is there anything you want to talk about?"

"No. Not really." She laid back down again.

"I'm here. Whatever you need," he said as he sat down.

She knew Severus wanted to help, but there was no help with this. Nothing could change what had happened.


On Saturday morning she managed to hold herself together enough to pull on a pair of trousers and a jumper. She wouldn't have bothered, but she knew Severus was going to insist that she see Torey today. Rachel had considered the shower stall for a brief moment but had decided that the likelihood of a small space anxiety attack was simply too likely today. Hopefully she didn't smell too bad. She washed her face and tied back her hair. She didn't spend too long looking in the bathroom mirror because it was freaking her out. She didn't look like herself.

An hour later, after flooing to Spinner's End and then apparating to the alley near Torey's office, Rachel sat down in the waiting room with Severus sitting next to her. There was the mother that they usually saw in the waiting room and Rachel wondered if she was muggle or magical. She knew that Torey saw muggle patients as well as magical ones. Either way, Rachel had the strange urge to tell her to take her child and flee the country before it was too late.

Maybe it was already too late. Maybe the best thing they could do was to get everyone to flee Britain. She'd had the creeping suspicion for a long time now that they were losing the war and that it was happening more quickly than anyone had anticipated. There were attacks reported almost every day in the Daily Prophet. Rachel suspected that there were also attacks that weren't being reported - it was hard to know if a muggle went missing or was murdered by magical means.

"Rachel?"

She jolted. She hadn't even been aware that Torey was in the room or that the mother had left with her daughter.

"Do you want to talk with just me or do you want Severus as well?" Torey asked.

"Just you," Rachel said as she stood. She followed Torey into her office and slumped down onto the sofa. She wasn't even sure what to say.

"Do you want to talk about how you're feeling?" Torey prompted after a long silence.

"Not really."

"Okay. We don't have to talk about anything you're not ready to talk about."

Rachel pressed her lips together. "There's something I haven't told you. I probably should have, but I thought I had the situation under control with Severus and Professor Dumbledore," she finally said.

Torey looked worried but she nodded. "Do you want to tell me about it now?"

"I've been having conversations with the Dark Lord at night. He shows up in the space in my mind that holds our connection while I'm sleeping." She stopped and took a few unsteady breaths. "The Dark Lord killed my aunt and uncle because of something I said to him. And I watched him torture and kill my aunt and uncle through a vision, because he wanted me to watch. But that isn't really the part I need help with."

Torey looked a little paler than usual and her mouth had gone flat for a moment. "What part do you need help with?"

"I'm scared I'm going to freak out at him the next time I see him and get more people killed. He's threatened to kill people and tell people that it was in my name, and that I could have stopped the killing if I don't answer him and converse with him. I don't want to talk to him at all, but I have to. But I'm scared I'm just going to have a complete breakdown if I try to talk to him."

"Let's start with the idea that you don't control what the Dark Lord does. Unless you asked the Dark Lord to kill your relatives for you, then him killing them is not something that you caused."

Rachel shook her head. "Let's just focus on how we can get me not to freak out and get more people killed."

"You did not get anyone killed. Even if the Dark Lord kills someone in your name because you were upset or because you weren't talking to him, that is not your fault. Rachel, this is like a hostage situation. The Dark Lord is holding these hypothetical people hostage in order to get you to do what he wants."

"Then why doesn't he just say come to me or I'll kill some people?" Rachel asked. "He's been trying to convince me to go to him."

"Can he hurt you while you're talking to him in this connection in your mind? Cast spells at you? Hurt you physically?"

"No, that's the first thing we checked."

"Then this is his only hand and he knows he can't overplay it. He knows you're not going to go to him, so him killing someone if you refuse just loses his leverage. If he keeps telling you that he's going to kill someone unless you do what he wants, then he holds the power there as long as that's a threat to you," Torey explained. "You can't stop him from killing people. If the newspaper is to be believed, he is killing a lot of people."

"Are you going to leave Britain?" Rachel asked, both wanting Torey to go so that she was safe, and not wanting to not be able to talk to Torey.

"Not yet. We'll see how things go. Do you understand what I mean when I say this is a hostage situation?" she asked.

"I guess so, but I don't know how it helps."

"It means that you have some options, but also that you know some things up front. The Dark Lord is never going to let these hypothetical hostages go. The threat that he will kill them will always be there. There's also a very reasonable possibility that he would have been planning to kill these people anyway, only this time he says it's because you wouldn't negotiate with him. That does not make you responsible for their deaths. He is the only one who is responsible for their deaths."

"But what if I freak out?" Rachel asked, going back to the main problem.

"What do you think freaking out will look like?" Torey asked.

Rachel shrugged. "Crying. Maybe having an anxiety attack. Yelling at him."

"Maybe he wants you to do those things."

She shook her head. "No, you don't understand. He thinks he did me a favor."

"Why do you think he thinks that?"

"Because we were talking about child abuse. He wanted Malcolm to come home, and I said that Malcolm couldn't go home, because his father was abusing him. And that's how come Malcolm's father wound up being arrested by the aurors, because the Dark Lord checked and found out Malcolm's father was abusing him, so he wanted him sent to Azkaban so he can get him later when he feels he's been punished enough," Rachel explained.

"I'm not sure I fully follow that, but how does that come back to your aunt and uncle?" Torey asked.

Rachel looked down at where her hands were clenched in fists on her lap. "Because we were talking about child abuse. And I asked him if he condoned child abuse in his Death Eaters, because look what happened to Theo, and Draco, and Malcolm. And he said he didn't, and that pureblood children were supposed to be treasured and raised with the right ideals, and he said that the staff at the orphanage where he grew up had abused him and the other children there. And he mentioned me, and said that Severus should have killed my aunt and uncle, and that when he knew Severus, Severus would have. It was pretty clear that he felt my aunt and uncle should be killed."

"How does that conversation make it your fault?" Torey asked.

Rachel felt a surge of guilt and pressed her hands to her face. "Because I was the one who brought up the topic. He never would have killed them if we hadn't had that conversation. And he's going to expect me to be glad that they're dead. I'm not glad that they're dead. I just never wanted to see them again, and now I'm stuck with watching them scream and plead for their lives over and over in my head!" She took a couple of gasping breaths as she tried to control her panic.

"Slow breaths, count them if you need to. Open your eyes and see that you're here in my office. You can see the rug, which I got to hide this awful floor tiling. You can see the sofa, which is getting a little threadbare. What else can you see?" Torey coached.

She fought for her breaths. "I see the table. Someone dripped paint on it. I see the window and the building outside. I see the art on your walls."

"Good. Keep breathing. You're here in my office. Nothing is happening. We're just sitting here talking," she said, her tone soothing.

"I didn't want to talk about this, because this is what happens," Rachel said when she could make full sentences again without gasping for air.

"It makes sense that you're very upset about this right now. You saw something terrible happen to people that you knew well. I think you're also carrying around a lot of guilt right now. Guilt can be a very common emotion when someone dies. We've also talked before about control, and how wanting to control something and have power that you don't have can make things seem less threatening. You taking responsibility for your aunt and uncle's deaths is not going to help you. The power over life and death is something that you do not have. You also do not have control over what the Dark Lord is doing and that is scary. You did nothing wrong by having that conversation with the Dark Lord and you had no way to know what he was going to do next."

Rachel shook her head, trying to stop herself from crying. "I did what he asked. I answered his questions. I had conversations with him. I tried really hard. Severus said that he would still kill people in my name at some point, but I thought it would be after I had to refuse the Dark Lord something. I thought I'd be ready for it."

"You were doing all the right things, but just like we were talking about, the Dark Lord is outside of your control. And I'm not entirely convinced the Dark Lord thought he was doing you a favor. Isn't it also possible that he did this to hurt you? Is it possible that he showed you this on purpose to hurt and scare you?" Torey asked.

"I don't think so. He's been trying to convince me to join him and end the war with him. It doesn't make sense for him to try and do that and then try to hurt me."

"Maybe it does and maybe it doesn't. Do you think he actually believes you will join him?"

"No," Rachel admitted. "Theo thinks this whole thing is a mind game designed to distract me, Severus, and Professor Dumbledore."

"That seems like a good possibility to me too. He might even try to play this as if he was trying to help you and expect you to be grateful, when in reality he was trying to hurt you."

"I still don't know what to do when I see him next."

"I think whatever happens when you see him next is what happens. If you manage to hold a calm conversation with him, that's fine. If you yell at him or have an anxiety attack, that's fine too," Torey said with a small shrug.

"How is that fine?" Rachel asked.

"Because the Dark Lord has already shown that he will do what he wants no matter what you do. You said it yourself, you did everything that he asked for. He still killed people. I know it's hard, but you can't stop him from killing people."

"Eventually I can. The prophecy. Eventually I can stop him." Or at least her death would be the stepping stone to stopping him. She wasn't stupid enough to think she could kill the Dark Lord.

Torey nodded, though she looked a little uncertain. "But that's not going to happen in these…dreams? Conversations? I'm not quite sure what to call them."

"I think we're going to use the conversations to lure him somewhere. He'll know it's a trap, but if we set the trap up well enough, it shouldn't matter," Rachel said.

Torey was quiet for a very long time. "Is that something that you want to do or something that Severus or Professor Dumbledore are asking you to do?"

"They haven't told me the actual plan yet. That's just what I think we're going to do. I don't know how else we'd do it. Maybe Professor Dumbledore has a different plan. There are still things that have to be done first. We wouldn't have let the war go on this long if there weren't other parts that had to be done," Rachel explained, not wanting Torey to think they were letting it go on for no reason.

"It might be worth having a discussion with them and seeing what they want you to do and then you can decide what you want to do. It's your life, which means you get to decide if you want to be involved."

Rachel didn't argue. It wasn't worth the fight or the explanation that she'd been involved since before she'd been born. Ending the war was her responsibility and she fully accepted that.

"You're probably going to be feeling a lot of things for these next few months. People process grief differently at different times. Don't be surprised if you think about your aunt and uncle quite a lot. You might find yourself recalling things about them that you'd forgotten. Whatever you're feeling is okay, but I also want you to think about what we've talked about with trying to take control and responsibility over things we don't have control and responsibility over."

Rachel nodded. She fully expected these next few weeks were going to be pretty miserable. She felt pretty miserable.

"I'm going to be away from the nineteenth to the twenty sixth, but I'll see you on the twenty seventh. In the meantime, practice your paced breathing and your grounding when you need to and allow other people to support you. I know you have a lot of people who care about you and who want to be there for you," Torey said.

"Okay," Rachel said, because what else could she say. She was ready to go hide in Severus' quarters again.


Rachel had curled back up on the sofa again. She felt like her thoughts were too big for her to move her body. There was a small voice in her mind telling her to do things: get up, stop sulking, do her homework, check on her friends, stop worrying Severus. That voice wasn't yet competing with the larger feeling that if she moved she was going to completely break down, but she thought eventually it would.

A knock on Severus' office door caused her to jolt slightly. She felt super jumpy for reasons she didn't understand.

Severus stood and went into his office and about a minute later returned. "Millie and Theo are here. They want to know if you'd like to have lunch with your friends and your godfather. Do not feel pressured to go if you don't want to. They'll certainly understand if you choose not to today."

Rachel sat up and wondered if she could actually do this. She didn't want to break down in front of her friends. She didn't want anyone to see her like that. After taking a quick assessment of herself she thought she felt numb enough that she would be okay as long as she was careful about what she thought. "I'll try," she said as she put her shoes on.

"You can always come back here. You don't have to stay. If you need me, send your Patronus charm or have one of your friends send theirs. You're going to the third floor?" he asked.

"Yes. I'll be back after lunch," she said, standing up. She felt a little bit unsteady, like her body was just this thing that she was dragging along with her.

"If you're certain."

She wasn't exactly certain. She wasn't really anything at the moment. She went through the permeable wall into Severus' office and found Millie and Theo waiting.

"Can I hug you?" Millie asked.

Rachel nodded and accepted a hug from Millie. They stood for a moment, just breathing. Rachel pulled back when she felt strange emotions bubbling within her. She couldn't have emotions right now, they'd have to wait.

Theo looked particularly solemn. "Is there anything we can do to help?"

"Not right now. I'm just kind of taking this moment at a time," she said.

"If there is anything, we're all here for you. If you want to talk, or just someone to sit with, or anything else, we can do that," he said.

"Thanks. Sirius and Remus are here?" She wanted to go straight to their study room. She didn't think she could handle all of Hogwarts at the moment.

"They just got here. We have Malcolm with us today too," Theo reminded her.

"Good. I think he needs to get a chance to see Sirius before he goes to live with him," Rachel said, remembering that she needed to talk to Severus about giving Malcolm information about the Order before Malcolm was thrown into the middle of everything.

"Ready to go up?" Millie asked.

Rachel nodded. She was as ready as she was going to get.

The corridor was mostly empty until they reached the entrance hall, where there were quite a few students coming in and out of the Great Hall. Rachel ignored them, not wanting to see them looking at her, and they continued up the staircases.

She couldn't help but hesitate as they reached the study room. She cared about her friends, but she still didn't want everyone looking at her or pitying her. She took a slow breath and followed Theo inside. The rest of the study group was there, except for Draco. Malcolm was sitting in between Luna and Sirius. There were platters of food on the table along with bottles of butterbeer.

Rachel took her usual seat between Hermione and Millie.

"There we go, that's almost all of us," Sirius said. "Where's Draco these days?"

"With Pansy. It's like someone has cast a Sticking charm on them," Theo said.

"Young love is like that," Sirius said with a clearly amused smile.

"How have things been here at Hogwarts these past months?" Remus asked.

"Busy. Very busy, but otherwise alright. Our Defense teacher is good this year, so that's a huge relief. Mostly we're just preparing for our NEWTs," Hermione said.

"Try not to over study, I understand the impulse but it's not helpful in the long run," Remus said.

"We're working on taking breaks. We're trying to do fun things every now and then," Ginny said.

Rachel settled deeper into her chair and let the conversation wash around her as her friends talked about what they'd been doing these past few months, about their struggles with Arithmancy, and about their plans for the Christmas holiday. She felt oddly floaty, which she could almost hear Torey telling her was a sign of disassociation.

At some point she had to pull herself back together. She needed to eat, or she'd lose weight and then she wouldn't be allowed to do the things she needed to do. She needed to go to classes and do homework in case she learned something that would help against the Dark Lord. She needed to practice Defense and she needed to find the cup horcrux.

She took an unsteady breath. It just all seemed like so much.

Her mind was trying to think about her relatives again and she worked on pushing it away. She couldn't think about that here. This was the first step to her returning to classes. She had to be able to push away these thoughts and focus on what was happening in front of her.

Everyone had finished with their meals. Rachel blinked a few times at the empty plate in front of her. That was okay. She couldn't eat just yet.

"Can Rachel and I have the room for a while?" Sirius asked.

Rachel looked at him. She didn't want to have this conversation.

"Of course," Hermione said, standing up. The others moved to leave.

"I'll meet you in the entrance hall," Remus said to Sirius, pausing to put his hand on Rachel's shoulder and squeeze gently. "We can talk when you're ready."

Rachel nodded. That was not a conversation she wanted to have either. A minute later it was just her and Sirius.

He stood and moved so that he was sitting next to her. "So things are pretty shitty."

Rachel nodded again. That pretty much summed up this situation, if not in the words she'd choose.

"I had a lot of conflicting feelings about my parents' deaths. I learned about my mother's death while I was in Azkaban. I spent a lot of time thinking about her. Hating her. Wishing she'd been different. Feeling guilty that she was dead and I was alive. Wishing I was dead too. My father died shortly after my brother disappeared. I wasn't invited to the funeral, nor would I have gone if I had been invited. I hated him too. And I wished he could have been different."

"I don't hate my aunt and uncle. I just wanted to never think about them again."

"I wish it worked like that, I really do. Your past is a part of you. I spent years trying to pretend my family didn't exist. At school I could be someone different, no one had to know the Sirius Black who lived at my home. No one except Regulus. We fought. Pretty much whenever we crossed each other's path. He believed I was betraying the family and I hated that he was just going along with all of the pureblood superiority bullshit. I still felt responsible when he disappeared. If anything, I feel even more responsible knowing that he betrayed You-Know-Who."

Rachel exhaled. The numbness was receding and she could feel her chest being squeezed. "I didn't want them to die. All this time they were afraid of magic, and it turns out they were right."

"They were not right. Just like my parents were not right. Your magic was not a threat to them. Petunia hated magic because she was jealous, not because she was afraid of it," Sirius said firmly.

"She hated me. I was a little kid and she hated me."

Sirius sighed. "I know. I'm sorry, Rachel. I wish I could change things, I really do. If I could go back and fix things, make sure they knew Pettigrew was the traitor, I would in a heartbeat. I would have raised you if I had been there, I swear it."

Rachel shook her head. "That's not your fault. You couldn't have known what was happening."

"Even so, just like so many things, I wish I could change it. If I'd known Regulus wanted out, I would have gone to him and offered him sanctuary. If I'd known Pettigrew was a traitor I would have killed him before he could betray James and Lily. If I'd known you were going to be given to Petunia, I would have taken you that night and left the country. But we can't change these things."

She thought of all the things she wished she could have done differently, things that might have saved her aunt and uncle, things that might have stopped the war before now. "It's not your fault, you couldn't have known." She felt another flood of guilt, warring with the knowledge that she couldn't have known either.

"You're right. And I have to keep telling myself that. There's no way to know what will happen next. We just have to try and hope for the best."

"We're losing the war, aren't we?" she asked.

"Yes. Slowly, but we are. The Wizengamot currently stands at fifty two members. Chances are pretty good that we're going to lose the Wizengamot and then the Ministry in the next six months," he said, running a hand over his mouth.

"What happens then?"

"We increase evacuation efforts. The aurors and the MLE patrol will become independent fighting forces and we'll coordinate with them. Top priority is getting Scrimgeour and Bones out of the country so that they and Dumbledore can get a Ministry in exile set up and we can plead our case to the ICW. We're probably looking at a twelve month evacuation effort before the Order, the aurors, and the MLE patrol withdraw. We'll take you out of the country long before that point."

Rachel frowned. She needed to be here if she was going to end this war. And she didn't want to draw the Dark Lord out of Britain searching for her.

"I'm not going to tell you not to worry about it, because of course you're worried about it. The best thing you can do right now is keep yourself safe and practice Defense so that you're ready, just in case. We're going to keep you as far away from the fighting as possible. Are there threats within the school this year?" Sirius asked.

"No, everyone who was threatening me is gone. We're keeping our eyes on a few people, but there hasn't been anything like what was happening last year." Thank god for that. She could not deal with one more thing right now.

"Good. Keep your eyes open. Someone may be playing a long game. Do you want to come to Headquarters over the Christmas holiday? Get away from all of this for a while?" he asked.

"No, thank you. I'll see if I can come by for dinner on Christmas day like we usually do," she said. She didn't want to be surrounded by the chaos of the Order right now. "Go easy on Malcolm, okay? He's struggling right now."

"I'm sure he is. I'll keep an eye on him. Is there anything I can do for you?"

"I don't think so. I just need some time."

"That's fine. Take all the time you need. They're not pressuring you into going to classes right now, are they?"

"No. Severus says I can go back when I'm ready to go back."

"Good. Take your time. Don't push yourself either. You look pretty done for the day."

Rachel nodded. She wanted to go back to Severus' quarters and lay down where no one was going to talk to her.


She went back to classes on Wednesday more out of a sense that she should rather than out of any actual desire to go. She'd also caught up on her homework for the same reason. Theoretically she could have waited and done it over the holiday but she found that if she sat down with a quill and a piece of parchment she could actually focus for short periods of time.

It was a relief to feel her mind working again, but she couldn't keep it there for too long. She'd learned to take things in small chunks. Write a few paragraphs. Stare at the ceiling for a while. Focus on not feeling anything.

She was avoiding her bed entirely, but that couldn't last forever. She'd been sleeping for short periods of time during the day, and so far she'd been able to avoid talking with the Dark Lord. Waiting until he felt busy in order to sleep was an effective strategy, but it was completely incompatible with her day-to-day life. She hadn't yet returned to her dorm. That could wait until after the holiday.

Severus was worried about her. She could practically see him worrying. She just didn't know what to do about it.

For now, she sat in classrooms. Took notes occasionally. Sat at the Slytherin table for lunch and tried not to notice too much. More classrooms. Then studying with her friends.

They were all being supportive. Offering to talk, offering to sit with her, assuring her that they were there for her. She wanted to yell at them and make them understand that this was her fault, that they shouldn't be supporting her. But she didn't. She thanked them and sat and tried not to explode or break down.

The waves of guilt were still coming, sometimes stronger than others. Sometimes she could talk herself down from them and tell herself that she couldn't have known what the Dark Lord was going to do and that she couldn't have stopped him. Other times it just overwhelmed her.

She also felt she shouldn't be reacting this way to her relatives' deaths. She hadn't even seen them in six years. It wasn't like she had lost Severus or Sirius or one of her friends. Seeing it happen probably played a role in it. She thought if she'd just been told that her aunt and uncle were dead - if it wasn't playing on repeat in her mind - then she'd still feel guilty but she wouldn't be stuck this way.

For dinner she returned to Severus' quarters, forced herself to eat, and then curled back up on the sofa. She'd become somewhat of a permanent fixture there this week.

On Thursday the whole thing repeated itself with different classes. She brewed a potion and then after lunch she went to the study room and they reviewed and did homework. She went with them to the Great Hall for dinner, even though she could feel her mind screaming that it needed to get away.

After dinner they went up to the seventh floor for the DA. Rachel sat down on one of the windowsills and watched as they began the basic instruction for the Patronus charm, though they were only really teaching the students new to the DA. She was distantly glad to see Malcolm standing with Penelope and Viola. She hoped the DA would help him feel more capable.

The upper years were released from the lesson with instructions to practice casting the Patronus charm so that they could call upon it as easily as any other spell, and the lower years gathered around Hermione, Theo, and Ginny. Rachel knew she was supposed to be helping, she'd been taking most of the tutoring for the Slytherin lower years, but she couldn't seem to make herself move.

Susan approached, her light red hair hanging lankly in her face. "Can I sit?"

Rachel nodded and scooted over a little so that Susan could sit next to her.

"Can I ask you a question that I probably shouldn't ask?"

"Sure," Rachel said, though she wasn't sure what she was going to ask.

"Are you having trouble casting the Patronus charm after what happened to you? I can't cast it anymore."

"I haven't tried recently, but probably not at the moment," Rachel said after considering her answer for a moment. "I had some trouble with it last year. It takes longer now. The last time I cast it was for Charms class and I had to change some of the memories I use for it and really focus on those instead."

They sat quietly for a long moment, watching as the DA sent their Patronus charms to each other.

"In the first war, my grandparents, my aunt, my uncle, and my two baby cousins were killed. All in the last year of the war. Now my parents. My aunt Amelia and I are the only ones left in our family. I know I'm not the only one with a family like that. Your family is the same."

Rachel nodded almost absently. The Snow line ended with her. The last of the Evans line would be with her cousin Dudley. She wondered what he was doing. If they had come to get him from his school. If he would even be told that magic had killed his parents.

"I want to fight the Death Eaters. I want to stop this from happening and I want to do anything I can to fight back. I know Professor Dumbledore has a secret organization to fight the Death Eaters and I know you're part of it. I want to join too," Susan said, sounding full of conviction.

"I'm not a member of the Order," Rachel said, which was technically true, but only technically. Her task of finding the horcrux was Order work if anything was. Her task of killing the Dark Lord was the very definition of Order work. "Professor Dumbledore won't let students join, but if you ask him the last week of school, he'll probably let you join."

"You and your friends are joining?"

"Yes." Rachel wanted to believe that the war would be over by the time that was necessary, but if this horcrux problem continued to drag on they might have to fight. She needed to put herself back together so that she could find the horcrux.

"Good. I'll be there with you then. We'll make them pay, for what they did to my family, and for what they did to yours."

Rachel didn't know if there was such a thing as making the Death Eaters pay. As far as she could tell, they didn't care what happened to each other. "You're going into the Healers Program, aren't you?"

"That was my plan, but this is more important."

Rachel shook her head. "You can be in the Order and be a Healer too. We need Healers. We only have one and she can't always be there."

Susan was quiet for a long enough time that Rachel looked over at her to see what was going on. Susan's face was crinkled up like she was trying to stop herself from crying. "My mom said that I'd be a good Healer. That I was kind and patient and that I could really help people. She wanted me to do that instead of going into the MLE. I just want to help people."

"What you do with your life is your choice. If you want to be a Healer, you can help people, and you can still help with the war." Rachel didn't want to see Susan fight. She didn't want to see her die.

"Do you really think Professor Dumbledore would accept me for the Order if my focus was healing?"

"Yes, I do."

Susan exhaled heavily and nodded. "Maybe I can do that then. If it would really help."

"I think it would." If anything they were going to need more Healers as the war went on.

Rachel looked back out at the DA and felt a flood of dread about what was coming. They were losing the war and if she couldn't fix things soon, then everyone would need to flee.


She followed Severus into his office on Saturday morning when they heard a knock on his door. Theo, Hermione, Neville, and Malcolm were there.

Severus looked over them. "I believe I'm only sending Miss Granger and Mr. Baddock to Mr. Black's house, correct?"

"That's right, sir," Hermione said.

"I presume the rest of your group is on the train?" he asked.

"We dropped off Millie, Luna, Ginny, and Ron with the carriages a few minutes ago," Theo said.

Severus nodded. "Come in, Mr. Black should be waiting for you." He moved to the fireplace and took a handful of floo powder and tossed it in. "Twelve Grimmauld Place. Mr. Black, I have two students for you."

Rachel thought it was kind of funny to hear Severus refer to Sirius as 'Mr. Black'. Usually it was just 'Black' with a tone of irritation.

"We're here, you can send them through," came Sirius' voice.

"Can I hug you?" Hermione asked quietly, stepping closer to Rachel as Severus guided Malcolm into the fireplace.

Rachel nodded and gave Hermione a hug. "I'll see you in two weeks."

"You will. I hope your holiday goes as well as possible," Hermione said.

Severus motioned for Hermione and Hermione disappeared into the fireplace as well.

"We've got them," Sirius called.

"Rachel, do you want to come sit with us in the common room for a little bit?" Theo asked.

Rachel shrugged. She supposed it didn't really matter much where she sat. She'd slowly been doing better at controlling the waves of the guilt. They no longer completely overwhelmed her, they just left her feeling like she was being crushed. "Sure."

"Be in the Great Hall for lunch," Severus told her.

She nodded and followed Theo and Neville out of Severus' office.

"Pansy went home with Daphne and Astoria. Blaise went home because his mother insisted. Draco is probably back in the common room. The rest of the House is gone and as far as I can tell so is everyone else," Theo said as they walked.

"I'm the only Gryffindor who signed up to stay," Neville said.

"Everyone's parents probably want their children home right now," Theo said, sounding slightly bitter.

Rachel nodded. Hogwarts may be safe right now, but nowhere else was.

"Festina lente," Theo said to the wall to reveal the common room door.

Neville looked around. "Your guardian portrait listens from over there?"

"I know Curbin can open the common room, but I think this door just opens with the password without anyone listening," Rachel said.

They found Draco slumped on one of the sofas by the fireplace with his feet up on the low table. "Honorary Slytherin for the holiday?" he asked, raising his eyebrows at Neville.

"It's more comfortable here than in our study room," Theo said as he took a seat.

"We are not studying over the holiday. I refuse," Draco said.

"Fine with me," Theo said.

"Me too. I want a break," Neville said, sitting next to Theo.

Rachel sat next to Neville.

"What do we want to do over the holiday?" Theo asked after a long moment.

"We could go flying, the weather's not that bad," Draco suggested. "Rachel?"

"Sure," she said. She could fly. It might actually help a little.

"We could play around more with the Room of Requirement," Neville said.

"I had an idea about that, actually," Theo said. "I was wondering if we read a book and then tried to imagine a scene from it, and then see if the Room could do anything with that."

Rachel was mildly intrigued. She wasn't even sure what she'd pick, there were so many options to choose from. She could do Horath's house, or Winifred's library. She wouldn't pick anywhere from The Dark Tower, that would be too scary. Maybe Bilbo's home from the Lord of the Rings. Or the Abhorsen's house from Sabriel. At the very least, it was something to do.

"I'd also like to drop by the Restricted Section again, we're not going to have access to it much longer," Theo said.

"You have a pass?" Draco asked.

"No, but Rachel does, and we only browse when we're not in view of Madam Pince," Theo said.

"I'll come with you for that," Draco said.

"Me too, maybe they have some Herbology books in there," Neville said.

Rachel covered a yawn. Maybe she'd stay with them until after lunch and then sleep for an hour after she checked on the Dark Lord. She took a moment to check on him now. He was irritated about something. She didn't care enough to try and focus to figure out what. For now she could just sit with her friends and try to exist.


It took Rachel a moment to realize where she was. She must have fallen asleep by accident. She gave herself a hard pinch as the Dark Lord walked toward her, but she didn't feel anything. After that she closed her eyes and willed herself to open them in her bedroom, but that didn't work either. She was not ready to have this conversation with him.

"You were correct." The Dark Lord came to a stop in front of her.

Rachel glared at him.

"I dealt with Bertrand accordingly."

"So you only kill child abusers when they're muggles?" she snapped before she could stop herself.

"I did you a favor because you were too weak to do it yourself."

"I didn't want you to kill them!" she yelled, her voice going up to a high shriek. "I didn't want them dead!"

"Like I said, you are too weak to protect yourself. If you let the people hurt you walk away unpunished they just hurt you again. You should know this lesson by now." His tone was sharper now.

Rachel turned and walked away, heading in the direction of her manifestation.

"Don't walk away from me!"

"I don't want to talk to you! You killed my relatives!" She was shaking and felt like she was completely out of control.

The Dark Lord quickly approached her, his hand going through her shoulder as he grabbed for her. "I did the right thing. I made sure they suffered for what they did to you. What did Dumbledore do? He protected them. What did Severus do? Absolutely nothing. I stopped them. I made sure they could never hurt anyone again. I avenged you."

"No! You tortured and killed them because you like torturing and killing people! This was never about me, it was about what you could do to hurt me!" She ran out of room to walk away as she reached the hole that led out into the rest of her mind and considered if she could somehow push herself through it to escape. She needed out of here now.

"I am not hurting you, I am rescuing you. The same way that Severus rescued Malcolm. The muggles are the ones who hurt you, but it seems you can't remember that. I will remind you."

Rachel turned in alarm, watching as the Dark Lord drew his wand.

Instead of pointing it at her, he pointed it at her manifestation. "She is you. She will always be you. Commemini poena."

Rachel screamed as memories overtook her. Being slapped so hard her ears rung. Being thrown into her cupboard. Her uncle's belt. Her aunt with the cleaning fluid. The feeling of pain shooting through her body as a man hovered above her.

"Rachel! Rachel! Wake up!"

She jerked herself out of bed and fell onto the stone floor, scrambling to get away from the man on her bed. "Stop!"

"Rachel! It's Severus, you're in your bedroom."

She was panting for breath as she recognized that what he said was true. She was awake. She was back in her bedroom in Severus' quarters. That was Severus standing next to her bed, his wand in one hand. She wiped at her face as she got to her feet. "That's it. I'm going in there and I am closing the connection. I am done."

"Rachel," he began.

"No. I am done playing his games. No more."

"Was it a vision?" he asked.

"No. Just…just him." Rachel sat down on the edge of her bed, trying to get her shaking limbs back under control and closed her eyes.

"I would like to accompany you if you are attempting to close the connection, but it may not be the best idea to do this while you're upset."

She shook her head. "He did something. He did something to my manifestation." Her skin was crawling and she wanted to climb out of her body.

"Then let me accompany you, please."

"Fine." It wasn't like he could stop her. She looked at him, held his gaze and then closed her eyes to go into her mind. When she opened her eyes she was in her cathedral by the doors. She opened the door to let Severus in and then stalked between the pews to go through the door, down the hallway, and then down the staircase to where her manifestation was in her cupboard.

Her manifestation was already sobbing loudly when she arrived. "You were supposed to stop him. You're supposed to protect me from him." Her patience with her manifestation had ended a long time ago. She grabbed the cupboard door and slammed it shut. "Keep out, both of you!"

"Rachel," Severus said, sounding alarmed.

Her manifestation was screaming now, but Rachel threw her full weight against the cupboard door. "Stay in there! I hate you!"

The screaming grew louder and as the cupboard door blasted open they were pushed out of Rachel's mind. Rachel immediately closed her eyes again, intending to go straight back in. She could do this for as long as she had to in order to make that door stay shut.

"Rachel, stop," Severus said.

"No!"

"Rachel!" His hand was now tight around her upper arm. "Do not go back in there. You are hurting yourself. Your manifestation is part of you, you cannot cut yourself off from your mind."

"She's not part of me!" Rachel shouted.

"Open your eyes," he said in a tone that was about as commanding as she had ever heard from him.

Rachel opened her eyes and bit down on her lip as she tried not to cry.

"You cannot do this," he said after a few moments. "This is not the way to close the connection."

"I hate her. She's not me." Tears were rolling down her face now and she just wanted them to stop. She wanted to stop being so weak.

"She is not all of you, but she is representative of a part of you. She is not worthy of hate. She is a child and she is frightened and in pain." Severus' tone was now softer. "Hate the people who hurt her if you want to, but do not hate her. Do not hate yourself."

Rachel sobbed into her hands for a few minutes, leaning into Severus' hand on her back.

"He said he did me a favor," she said when she could speak clearly.

"He's lying."

"I know. He did something to my manifestation. He cast a spell at her, inside my mind, and it worked."

"What was the effect of the spell?" he asked.

"I remembered memories of my relatives. It was like I could feel it happening. That's when you woke me up. I didn't mean to fall asleep," she wiped at her eyes and managed to sit up a little straighter. "He's not supposed to be able to cast spells in my mind."

"He's not. I'm not sure what he's doing. You've been napping during the day because you're staying awake all night so you don't have to talk to him?"

She nodded.

"I don't think that's sustainable. Will you take one of your modified Dreamless Sleep potions if I bring you one?" he asked.

"Yeah. He probably won't be back tonight," she said. She very badly wanted eight hours of uninterrupted sleep.

"I'll get you the potion. Are you otherwise in pain?"

"No. No physical pain. Whatever he's doing by visiting the connection doesn't seem to be the same as when I'm seeing a vision." She supposed that was a relief. "Severus?"

"Yes?"

"If I had closed the connection, would that have stopped me from finding the horcrux?" she asked with a sinking feeling.

"That's a possibility. Since we're not sure how all of this works, I'm not sure what would have happened. Please promise me that you will not attempt to close the connection on your own," he said, watching her closely.

Rachel nodded. She might have nearly made a very serious mistake. "I won't. I promise."

"Did you want to talk about anything?"

"No, I just want to go to sleep." She was a little scared she would start crying again if she tried to talk about anything else tonight.

"I'll go get your potion then."

"Sorry I yelled at you," she said, feeling that she should say it.

"Thank you. I understand that you were distraught and not thinking clearly, but I appreciate the apology."

Rachel retrieved her pillow bunny and resettled her blankets and then cast a warming charm on her blankets. She would sleep tonight and then she would try to figure things out tomorrow.