The Peace You Bring

by WizKidd23

June 27, 1994. The day Madam Pomfrey is killed by a rogue werewolf near the Forbidden Forest. The magical world, including a grieving Potions Master, mourns the beloved matron. With Hogwarts in need of a replacement, Dumbledore appoints a Healer who fails to meet Snape's level of satisfaction. But he will soon find out, all while falling in love, she was predestined for this.

15. Chapter 15

A/N: Will be going on vacation next week, so there may or may not be a lapse in updates. Fortunately, you guys get 16,500+ words this chapter to gnaw on, so I recommend savoring each bite.

As always, love all the love ^_^ comments fuel me! New followers make me dizzy with gratitude.

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Chapter 15

"The willingness to show up changes us. It makes us a little braver each time." – Brené Brown

Fourteen weeks. Bex had but fourteen weeks to finalize and submit her research for the Hearteater Virus cure to the Institutional Review Board. She realized some time ago, at the conclusion of her first year of residency, that perhaps she'd taken on too insurmountable a task. A cure. Of all things.

But she was nothing if not ambitious. Then, it became a situation where she was far too stubborn to rework her hypothesis to something more manageable. And then, when it was definitely too late to backtrack, she resigned herself to continued failed trials and a dismal conclusion. After all, if she submitted nothing (as she was so apt to do just the year before), she would not be eligible to continue her third, and final, year of the residency program – a necessity if she wanted to be accredited internationally.

Failure was simply not an option.

She tried to blow a curl out of her face, but part of it must have been plastered to her forehead with sweat, because it went nowhere.

"Merlin, I don't have time for you!" she snapped, and paused her measuring to wrestle her wild hair back into the pineapple atop her head.

"Should I be taking cover?" Severus drawled from the opposite end of their shared workbench.

She shot him a scathing glare, and he returned her a devilish smirk that, ordinarily, would've caused her to flush, if she wasn't at the end of her rope. She continued her careful process of slicing lionfish spines length-wise in order to extract the toxins inside; having already gone through this stage of the brewing process dozens of times, she'd perfected her technique, and was able to accomplish the not-so-small feat with relative speed and ease. Once again, she'd gotten lost in her work, and when she finally glanced up at him again, she could see that he was still watching her. Mental images of a night not too long ago were shoved to the forefront of her brain. Her face warmed ever so slightly, and she cleared her throat, ducking her head.

They were in his private lab again, for the first time since brewing the Draught of Living Death for the Second Task. It was quite humid in the dungeon room, as they were both brewing at fairly high temperatures, and had been for awhile now. The heat made her flush all the more visible, and she continued extracting the toxins in mild irritation.

"Eyes on your own cauldron, Professor."

He was silent. No snarky reply. Not even a scoff or a long-suffering sigh.

She thought it odd, and so, after giving her potion a stir and turning the fire down low (she'd be damned if she ruined the control so close to finishing the brew), she looked up at him fully. He wore a very pensive expression, eyes moving from her workspace to her cauldron, and back again.

"Severus?" She sat her stirring rod down, concern flickering on her face.

His voice was soft. "Your mother – she was the one you lost to this virus."

Whatever she was expecting from him, it hadn't been that. She shut her eyes momentarily and sighed. How much of their relationship was just going to be unearthing the other's secrets? When she opened her eyes, she saw he'd made a tiny movement in her direction – almost like he would have retracted his words before they reached her ears, if he could.

"Yes," Bex replied quietly. "She was."

"And you watched her die… long before it ever occurred."

"I did. I believe I was three… or, four. I dunno – I was young."

There was another stretch of silence; she figured, like Rowan, he was trying to figure out a way to digest and respond to this latest revelation. It was time to add the neurotoxin infusion to her potion (she could tell based on the slightest of changes in the scent profile), a task that required more of her concentration than she could lend to their dialogue.

"One, two…" Bex counted out twenty-two drops of the infusion, her charmed quill moving at rapid speeds somewhere behind her. She sniffed. Odd. The mixture had lost its smell entirely – though its consistency and color stayed the same. Odorless potions were intriguing indeed, and as her experiment had yet to yield such a result, she made sure to make a special notation.

All of her Arithmantic calculations indicated a need to now turn off the heat beneath her cauldron, allowing the potion to stabilize and cool for ten minutes before its immediate use. Dragon's blood (even dried in powder form, as she'd used in this brew) wasn't exactly the most shelf-stable ingredient, so the antidote would need to be administered straight away upon completion. While the brew cooled, she would need to prepare the sheep's heart.

Severus was closer – When had he moved so close? His face again expressionless, signaling some deep internal conflict. Bex continued prepping the heart, confident he would speak when he was ready.

First, she released it from stasis, and lifted it out of its thermoregulation container. Then, keenly aware of dark eyes noting her every action, Bex cast a variation of the Densaugeo hex on the sheep's heart; the result was an organism that fell somewhere between Cor Cordis and a heart riddled with the Hearteater Virus. Cartilaginous teeth grew, slicing through valves and ventricles; what looked like molars ripped through the descending aorta. Once the hex had taken affect, she had about twenty minutes before the heart was rendered useless, so Bex began to quickly pack wet swamp soil around it, to the shock of her audience.

"Oh, yeah," she remarked casually. "You've yet to witness a full trial, haven't you?"

His eyes cut across her like cool glass, pursing his lips at the amusement barely concealed in her tone, and then his gaze ricocheted back to the heart that was now writhing on the table. It suffocated under the soil, the aorta snapping wildly as it curled this way and that, almost like it was seeking air to breathe.

But Bex knew better. It wasn't breathing – although, thanks to the spell she'd used, it was still beating. Barely. If left to its own devices, the cursed heart would thrash and shake, and rip itself to shreds while its "teeth" continued to grow unchecked.

"Walk me through your method," Severus said softly, amending it with a "please" at her wrinkled nose.

"The soil should be nearly dry before the antidote is poured over it," Bex recited from her notes. "Applied practically, one healer would be responsible for containing the soil with a series of charms, ensuring it remains in a controlled area and preventing it from contaminating other parts of the body. The primary healer would then carefully irrigate the potion through the open chest cavity, over the affected organ – the heart – continuously, until it's completely absorbed. The charmed soil acts as a catalyst for healing."

While she spoke, Bex decanted the potion into another flask.

He sniffed deeply. "It has lost the scent of lavender."

"I noticed that, too." She tried to keep the little bubble of hope out of her voice. The hope is what destroyed her every time. So, she opted for forced objectivity, again and again, despite how close she was to the project. Over five years, she'd conducted endless experiments, modified her hypothesis maybe four or five times, and sunk countless hours into procuring empirical evidence and data. Objectivity, not hope, was perhaps the only thing fueling this project right now.

Yet, she couldn't get rid of the bitter tang of sorrow and guilt on her own tongue as she began pouring the potion over the twitching sheep's heart. All this time, and she wouldn't have shit to show for it but a failed result. A remarkable feat, or a foolish one? At least the heart hadn't exploded on the table yet, as it had many times before. That would be embarrassing, given his eyes hadn't moved from the table in some time. She begged the gods to just let the heart roll over and die – dry out and shrivel up like it had in some of the earlier trials. If she was forced to look him in the face after an organ exploded all over his private lab, she would quite literally flee the country.

Twenty seconds passed. There was no eruption of blood and tissue. The heart continued beating faintly, absorbing the antidote with a quenchless thirst. Bex hadn't realized her eyes were

widened with astonishment until she heard Severus' hoarse whisper.

"Rebecca –"

"SHH! Don't jinx it!"

She felt (but did not see) him swoop around to her side of the workbench. Her eyes were glued to the heart that was no longer thrashing about. She had perhaps 110 milliliters of antidote left to administer and they were seeing no adverse reaction.

And then, the cartilaginous teeth began dwindling.

Behind her, Bex's quill flew in a frenzy, practically sparking a flame on the parchment paper. She was stunned, standing there with the nearly empty flask in hand. A buzzing, beginning low in her ears, heightened to an almost painful frequency. Her mouth was dry. Her hands all but froze.

"Rebecca. You've done it."

She blinked once. Twice. The antidote was gone; not an ounce remained in the flask when she set it on the wooden table. The transfigured tooth-like growths were gone as well. Meaning she could be well on her way to clinical trials with this research by September of this year – meaning she was that much closer to eradicating the illness that consumed her mother. Meaning…

"I've done it." Finally, she looked at Severus. His eyes – black as the blackest night – were shining with pride and reverence.

"I thought it impossible." He took her hand in his tentatively. "You – proved me wrong."

"I think I've just proven a lot of people wrong," she said in one breath. Including me.

He brought her hand to his mouth and placed a kiss on the back of it. "Where are you to go from here?"

Surprisingly, Bex managed to stay upright, despite her weakened knees. "I have to compile everything, and then, hopefully move to clinical trials after I've made my research presentation in August. Oh! I'll also need to identify the variable that resulted in this outcome. Although – I already highly suspect it's because I used powdered dragon's blood this time – none of the other brews had it. Ha! I had a feeling, too. Oh, where did my notes go?"

She turned and violently snatched her clipboard out of the air, but not before quickly standing on tiptoe to press a kiss to Severus' pale cheek; she would never forget this day, his silent encouragement, for as long as she lived. Already engrossed in data and measurements, she did not see the small smile that lit up his face. He watched her back but for a moment, maybe two, before retreating to his own cauldron.

For Bex, the following days felt as if she were floating on a cloud of pure euphoria. Nothing could bring her down from this high – never had she experienced such invincibility. Power. Victory.

And it had not a thing to do with her Sight.

For the first time in a rather long while, she was beginning to feel a sense of purpose. Innate ability wasn't enough, and it never had been, even when she was a child; not in her eyes. But this antidote – the antidote that would cure Hearteater Virus victims of their accursed disease – would be her contribution to the world. This remedy, once trialed, perfected, and trialed again, would be her driving force in this life. It was already too late for her mother, and an untold number of dead… but, there was still hope for the magical folk who'd yet to succumb to its gaping maw.

Severus urged her to get some sleep, knowing it wouldn't come easy on the heels of such a phenomenal breakthrough. He'd watched her glide wherever she went around the castle, since Sunday, and was now on the cusp of taking some incredibly drastic measures.

"I am not above confiscating your notes until tomorrow," he'd challenged evenly, when it looked like she wouldn't leave the work at her desk in the Hospital Wing. It was well past midnight. His gaze hovered over the offending notes in question, eyeing them like he would make a move to grab them any second.

"You wouldn't dare!" she hissed, keeping the parchment away from him, with an admittedly feral edge to her tone.

He cocked a brow rather… sexily. "Do you care to test me? Rebecca, the Final Task is in just a few hours – I will bind your research materials and take you up to bed myself, if I must."

She raised a brow of her own, attempting to match his height. A playful smirk tugged at the corner of her mouth. "Oh, really? Well then, off we go –"

"To sleep, vixen!" he nearly choked.

Bex pouted. Then sighed, and scrubbed her face with one hand.

"Yeah… I guess it is time to get some rest now." Yawning, she stood. After not moving from one spot for hours, she was rather lightheaded, and it almost caused her to sit right back down. With a tired flourish of her wand, Bex packed everything away, planning to pick right back up at the conclusion of the Triwizard Tournament. (That is, if there were no serious injuries sustained in the last leg of the competition.)

Severus pulled her in for a brief kiss (too brief, in her opinion), and her exhausted brain registered just how firmly he held her when he turned her around in the direction of her room, and pushed her forward.

"Bed – now."

Bossy. Bex wished the muscles around her eyes weren't too tired to narrow at him. Another involuntary yawn pulled escaped her instead, and with a whispered, "g'night, Severus," she departed the infirmary under his watchful eye.

Halfway up the relatively small tower, she realized collapsing was imminent. Shit. All she had to do was make it to her sitting room, and she could crash on the couch for the night. The thought of someone – worse yet, Severus – finding her crumpled body at the bottom of the stairs was so embarrassing, it fueled her weary legs to make it to the top. She fell face first into the sofa, and was still blessedly able to kick off her work shoes. Trepidation loomed in the back of her mind. For as long as she'd been abstaining from Dreamless Sleep (weeks now, at this point, since that fateful night in January), Bex was yet to See anything in her dreams… or, have any dreams at all. She'd done the math – twenty-three weeks and five days since her last dose of the draught – and felt, perhaps, she was long overdue for a truly restless night. She'd yet to even dream of Viktor Krum's inevitable demise – though she did feel it, simmering gently in her subconscious thoughts like a potion she neglected to stir.

Was this the calm before the storm – the eye of a hurricane? She'd tried to wean herself off of the addictive draught before, but the nightmares caused her to relapse every time. Headaches, nausea, drowsiness, difficulty concentrating – all adverse effects of quitting that she could deal with or counterbalance in some way or another… but it was the nightmares. Always the nightmares that made her reach for the vial of Dreamless Sleep in her nightstand, again and again. If she had to See the terrified face of Legory's young daughter again, as they were consumed by Fiendfyre, she was certain her resolve would fracture – break cleanly down the middle, as it had many times before.

Bex closed her eyes and watched the warm firelight from the hearth dance behind her eyelids. She pictured the hourglass from Severus on the mantle above the fireplace, but was too exhausted to Summon it. Let alone actually use it for its intended purpose, and meditate.

With a heavy sigh, she settled further into the couch. Her body refused to move to grab the throw blanket at the opposite end, but she was able to wriggle her feet underneath it so that her toes received the warmth they sought. Partially protected now from the drafty castle air, Bex felt herself slipping deeper into unconsciousness.

She'd barely begun dozing when she was violently ripped away from the brink of what was likely to be a naturally dreamless sleep. Energy pulsed around her, and she held her head gingerly. For as far as she could see, everything was white – just an empty white space void of any objects or rooms or people. Her feet propelled her forward, but the white was so blinding, it was difficult to keep her eyes open more than a squint. Her feet slipped unsteadily on a slick surface. Another pulse of energy almost brought her to her knees, but she kept moving, going nowhere; determined to get somewhere. She tripped over nothing, and instinctively stretched her arms out in front of her. To her terror, her hands disappeared into the white… Was this fog?

No… it wasn't fog just a second ago, she thought with despair.

But sure enough, instead of the brightly-lit void in which she'd been walking for the past few minutes, thick, ghostly fog extended for miles. So thick, she actually began choking on it. Panicked, Bex picked up her pace until she was almost running. Bare feet pounded the cold, flat ground that grew more and more icy the further she jogged.

Snow?

Bex stumbled over the freezing terrain, looking around wildly. No longer was her eyesight obscured by the fog, and in the distance, through a whirling snowstorm, she could make out a small cabin.

She rushed towards it. Smoke was billowing from the chimney, indicating someone was inside.

Let's get this over with, she thought caustically. She wouldn't even bother knocking; her hand reached towards the knob, but the door flew open before she could even make contact. Slowly, she dropped her arm. Neither seeing nor hearing anyone, she stepped inside and shut the door behind her.

A force pulled her forward, too fast for her to make out any of the faces in the hanging portraits, or any of the décor dotting the walls. However, she could see that, like most magical homes, it was far roomier on the inside than the exterior would lead one to believe. Even without getting a good look at her surroundings, she had an inkling whose fate she was to stumble upon.

The room she entered next was much smaller than the one previous. A bedroom. Inside, she counted four, dark-haired, strong-looking witches and wizards gathered around the prone figure laying on the bed. Krum raised a weathered hand and beckoned his eldest child closer. The young man – who favored a much younger Viktor than the old, sickly one Bex now stared at – hurriedly stepped up and knelt down so that his father could whisper something in his ear.

The young man stood abruptly, pain written across his face. He nodded, glanced at his siblings, then left the bedroom. One of the young women let out a small sob and her sister shushed her before wrapping a consoling arm around her shoulders. Bex took in their anguish, approaching Viktor's bed slowly until she was standing right above his head. She peered down at the boy – man – whom she'd seen chatting to Hermione Granger in the Great Hall just two days ago. His face was weighted with heavy lines and creases; gone was his thick, dark hair, which he seemed to have given to all of his children, leaving thin white whisps on his head. His brow, however, had somehow retained its full bushy glory, set high above a pair of folds that were likely closed eyelids.

Bex breathed, and felt her chest constrict. She gasped, rubbing at the sudden pain with the palm of her hand, but it, of course, did not dissipate. Her heart was burning, and throwing itself this way and that to escape the heat. Bex looked around madly at Krum's children who could (obviously) neither see nor hear her. Her distress was purely her own.

Was this a heart attack?

No… wizards can't have heart attacks.

As she mentally went through a list of magical ailments Krum could be suffering from that would explain such a peculiar symptom, Bex turned back to him to see that he was staring right at her.

Not through her. At her.

Bex blinked hard. Perhaps she was mistaken… but, no. His eyes were locked steadfast onto her face, searching for a clue as to why she was visiting him in his final hour. Never, in all of her twenty-six odd years, had this ever happened, and she was at a loss of what to do next.

"I knew you vould come," he spoke in a gravelly voice.

Several things happened at once; the three adults in the room sprung forward, clamoring and speaking over one another. They still could not see Bex, who almost fell on her bottom taking a shaky step backwards. Her heart was racing and her palms were sweaty. Viktor ignored his children who were all vying for his attention.

"After that day… after you healed me," he continued, "When I vent home, I read about others like you, and I knew you vould come to visit me… it happens on this day, then, yes?"

Vitkor's eyes pierced her, his children following his gaze in profound confusion; they, as she was accustomed, peered right through her. Around her. Slightly above her. Anything but directly at her. At Bex's nod, Viktor again closed his eyes and laid his head back.

"It is just a broken heart. I haff lived a good life."

There was a moment of silence. And then, the man who was only a few years younger than Bex sighed despondently.

"That's it. There goes his mind. It won't be long now."

He'd said the hushed words mostly to himself, in Bulgarian, but Bex could still understand him just as plainly as if he hadn't spoken in his native language. Again, the lurching, indescribable pain in her chest tore a gasp from her mouth. Curiously, Viktor stayed completely unmoving, like he wasn't also experiencing the torturous burning. Eventually, he sighed – deeply.

The young man's sisters were now scolding him for his disrespect, to which he shrugged with an indifferent look upon his face. Such an unemotional response apparently warranted more arguing and bickering; it wasn't long before all three siblings were again talking over each other. Bex watched it all unravel before her in melancholic silence.

Things were beginning to escalate even further when Viktor's eldest son re-entered the bedroom, a grim set to his strong jaw. He brought in tow a healer who appeared (presumably) to be from a private practice. The healer asked all four siblings quietly if he should run a diagnostics charm on their father, his somber eyes falling to rest on the former Quidditch hero.

The children declined, each of them – surprisingly – in agreement for the first time since Bex arrived. The oldest of the two sisters spoke up, switching effortlessly from Bulgarian to German.

"You are here for appearance's sake only," she said, without any real bite. "We know what is ailing him. Just stand back. And give us time with our father."

"You vill have to excuse my daughter's manners." Viktor did not crack open so much as a single eyelid. Through all the conversation, Bex felt the searing pain in his heart as though it was happening in her own. His deep voice continued on, and there was nothing in his tone that betrayed how excruciating the sensation was.

"All of my children have had to vatch their father deteriorate so rapidly after already losing their mother. I promise you – they usually are not so rude. They are… grieving." Here, he opened his eyes wearily, meeting each of their gaze. "But they should hold themselves and each other accountable once I am only ashes and memories. They must."

His words, of course, received a mixture of reactions. The eldest nodded stoically – so much like the Viktor Krum in Bex's current timeline – whereas the youngest broke his father's scrutiny to continue looking outside a window at something in distance. The sisters were again clutching one another, as they had been when Bex came in. While one wept silently, the other shushed and rubbed her sister's arm. It was a moment so intimate, Bex wished she could just give them all the privacy their small family deserved.

Viktor rounded on her one last time, eyes narrowed in what Bex could only describe as impatience.

"You vere meant to be here," he said hoarsely, and she was suddenly able to hear the discomfort lacing his voice. "To see this, I am thinking – so I could thank you for the life you gave me. My children. My vife, who I vill meet again soon. My – everything. Thank—thank you."

Her heart catapulted against her rib cage. Viktor's eyelids lowered of their own accord. Gasping, choking, he lifted a hand to the nearest of his children, and they all huddled in closer around him. Bex felt their love and devotion for their father just as palpably as if it were directed towards her. It stole the remaining breath from her constricting lungs with a whoosh and a gasp of her own.

A peaceful expression settled over Viktor's aged face; the youngest of his daughters was holding his hand tightly, too tightly, but he didn't seem to mind. In fact, for a man taking his final, dying breaths, he was oddly…

Relieved.

When Bex awoke just a few short hours later, there were still fresh tears on her cheeks. She scrubbed her face with one hand, releasing a shaky breath. After laying there for a few minutes, she moved to get up – but not to get ready for her day. She stumbled from the cozy embrace of the sofa, reaching for the hourglass Severus had given her. She snatched it off the mantel and sank to the floor. Her fingers brushed the cool glass as she closed her eyes and turned it upside down in her hands.

"Ad pacem in mentis."

RK + SS

The following afternoon – the day of the Final Task – was terribly overcast with a looming threat of rain. Such a drastic shift from the bright and sunny morning they were blessed made an uneasy feeling settle in Bex's bones.

A part of her hoped for rain even though, rationally, she knew inclement weather would not stop the conclusion of the Triwizard Tournament. She sat in the Great Hall, moving the vegetables in her soup around with the back of her spoon while continuing to fill up on rich, dark coffee. The hall was abuzz with raucous chatter; that there were no more final exams left to take only served to intensify the mounting excitement in the air. Bex did her best to tune out all of the extra noise, without actively Occluding, as she tried to keep her wits about her. The Final Task was, obviously, the most dangerous and most challenging of them all – and though the champions had already proven themselves more than capable of Defense, Bex wished she'd been able to pull an extra set of hands or two from Erinlẹ's… just in case things went sour in that stupid fucking maze.

She adjusted the tilt of her head ever so slightly, once more setting eyes upon all four champions amidst the swell of people in the Great Hall. Harry sat at the Gryffindor table, surrounded on all sides by the Weasleys; unsurprising, given the late Madam Pomfrey's rather… strong language used to describe the Dursleys. Harry appeared happy enough to be in the presence of found family, which put Bex's mind slightly at ease.

Cedric was chatting happily with his father, Amos Diggory, near the doors while his mother looked out fondly over the Great Hall; Fleur sat not too far at Ravenclaw table with Gabrielle and their parents. And it was only because Bex was observing the champions so closely that she noticed Fleur passing frequent looks over her mother's shoulder at the red-headed family gathered around Harry.

Or, more likely, a specific member of that family.

Bill Weasley chuckled heartily at something George (Fred?) was saying, clapping his younger brother on the back. Bex huffed a small laugh herself, seeing Fleur blush a bit, flip her hair, and turn her head as though she suddenly found the enchanted ceiling utterly fascinating. The Healer continued her silent watch, eyes roving once more over Viktor Krum. It was always an interesting experience, encountering a person again after Seeing their death. It became, unfortunately, one of the biggest wedges that eventually cleaved her relationship with her mother right in two.

Bex lifted her coffee to her lips, hoping the lukewarm liquid would wash down the ash piling in her throat.

Viktor was sitting rigidly, like a statue, in his seat at the Slytherin table. His bread and bowl of soup both remained untouched – while his parents, the spitting image of their grandchildren, conversed with some of the older, more affluent Slytherin students. From her seat at the Head Table, Bex could just barely make out the contemplative expression on Viktor's (markedly youthful) face. She wondered if he was worried about surviving the challenge – not completely unreasonable, based on the maturation of some of the creatures crawling within the maze. (Hagrid was particularly proud of how large his Blast-Ended Skrewts had grown.)

The urge to tell him not to worry – that he would survive the challenge and go on to live a long, full life – it was too great. Bex distracted herself by turning her eye again on young Harry, repeating her vigilant watch all over again.

Soon, the rest of the teaching staff began trickling into the hall, signaling the true end of final examinations. Filius strolled in with Professor Sinistra, both engrossed in rapt conversation with each other. Septima came through the doors not too long after, bustling to take her seat next to Bex and probably hoping she still had time to fill her stomach before the tournament.

"How was it, Auntie?" Bex greeted.

Septima spooned another ladle of hot potato soup into her bowl. She gratefully took the slice of sourdough bread being offered to her by her niece.

"I always have to deal with at least one panic attack from one of my students – I was thinking I would get away this year scot-free when poor Cassiopeia Flint began hyperventilating in the middle of the exam."

"Oh, no!"

Septima sighed, long and slow as she chewed her bread, clearly as relieved to be done with examinations as most of her students.

"And she seemed to be the most well-prepared of them all. Artemis, help them."

"Arithmancy isn't an easy subject."

"It's not. It definitely is not." Septima spooned a bit of soup into her mouth, made a face, and Summoned a nearby bottle of hot sauce. "She's done remarkably well – they all have. Poor dears just build it up bigger in their heads than what it needs to be."

Bex could drink to that.

"Put some food in your stomach, young lady," her aunt scolded, eyeing the cup of coffee hovering by her lips.

Flushing, Bex murmured something about not being too full for the Final Task… but nibbled at her salad all the same.

"One would think you have been chosen by the Cup to compete," Septima teased.

This caused Bex to snort a laugh. "Thank the gods I'm not!" A movement by the doors caught her attention – Severus slipped into the hall, parting a small group of students like a raven through the Red Sea. He scowled at the children only briefly before his eyes were drawn upwards to rest upon her.

And for a split second, it was as though everyone and everything else in the Great Hall melted away. For that minute slip of a second, it was just the two of them; it was him, staying the night after Viktor's injury. Him, pressing a kiss to her hand and telling her that she'd proven him wrong with her cure. Him, murmuring his delight into her neck, praising her for wearing the robes he'd gotten her for Christmas. Across the Great Hall, his eyes, for just a fraction of a second, conveyed emotions he would never dream of giving voice to, especially in a setting such as this.

Then, he was turning his head and striding with purpose over to the Slytherin table where his students were commingling with the Krums. He introduced himself to Viktor's parents, his words lost in the sea of noise that was the Great Hall at lunchtime.

"You and that man – you both think you're so subtle."

Septima's familiar voice brought Bex back to their own conversation. The one she'd been woefully distracted from. She blinked quickly, and then her aunt's words actually sunk in. A panicked feeling began bubbling up her throat.

"You – We –" she stammered, and cleared her throat lightly. "We're not subtle?"

At her niece's rushed, scandalized whisper of a question, Septima cackled quite loudly. Loud enough to turn a few heads nearby and – Merlin – definitely loud enough to attract Severus' attention, but Bex kept her eyes fixed on her aunt. Her cheeks were burning; it would be nothing, glancing his way to see if he was watching them, but she didn't know if she would recover upon catching his eye again.

"You are to anyone who isn't watching the two of you."

Bex didn't get the opportunity to respond because, at that moment, Dumbledore was announcing that Bagman would now escort the champions down to the Quidditch Pitch for the Final Task; the rest of the school and spectators following in approximately five minutes. That served as Bex's cue to get up and exit silently with Harry, Cedric, Fleur, and Viktor. The applause that followed them out of the Great Hall was deafening.

The walk down to the pitch – which had been converted into a labyrinth made of twenty-foot-high hedges – was relatively quick. At the annex between the stands and the entrance to the maze, Bex gave the champions their final physical checkup; then, with a deep pang in her belly, she bid them farewell and good luck. The sky was a dark, slated grey with only a faint shadow of the moon peeking through the thick expanse of clouds. She breathed in the sweet early evening air, trying to sort out her own nausea that stretched and expanded in her stomach like cold wax, before taking her designated seat near the judges section. She'd barely sat down when she felt the telltale rumble of an approaching crowd beneath her feet. In no time, the stands were filled.

"Auntie! Here!"

Bex waved her hand high until she caught Septima's attention, the aforementioned witch weaving through the milling students with practiced ease.

"Potter all good?"

Bex nodded, eyes flicking down towards the four children lined up at the entrance of the maze.

"Nervous. Understandably so. They all are."

Septima sighed. "We'll all be more than a bit relieved once this is all over… won't we?"

Relieved. That was an understatement. Bex would be positively ecstatic once the tournament was over, and students weren't actively putting themselves at risk. Thrilled, even. Then she could go back to funneling all of her free hours into her research. As best as possible, she ignored the little twinge in her stomach staring down at Harry, Viktor, Cedric, and Fleur. They all looked so small down there.

"I believe so," Bex agreed finally. A flash of red captured her interest, and she craned her neck slightly to see Filius, Minerva, Hagrid, and Moody approaching Bagman and the others down in the stadium – each professor was wearing a large, luminous red star that marked their vigil. "I wonder why Severus isn't down there." She was mostly speaking to herself now, recalling just how quick and precise he was with his spellwork.

After a beat, Septima said, "You could probably ask him that yourself."

Bex furrowed her brow, drawing her attention away from whatever Minerva was telling each of the champions. Certain as the stars above them, there he was – marching towards her and her aunt with the same determined stride he'd used earlier in the Great Hall.

"Healer Kakudō."

"Professor Snape." She was suddenly – unfortunately – hyperaware of the fifth year girls sitting just a couple of rows behind.

"I take it this seat is not… occupied?" Gods, how could he say so much with one little quirk of the brow?

"Not currently, no, Professor," she replied as smoothly as her nerve would allow. "You're welcome to sit with us and enjoy what will doubtlessly be another captivating spectator event."

He sat cautiously, like she might change her mind; a tiny smirk tugged at his mouth.

"Severus! How nice of you to join us!"

Severus nodded his head towards her aunt, and she had to stifle a chuckle. "Professor Vector," he drawled in greeting, and his eyes flickered between the both of them, perhaps noting the slight similarities and distinct differences. His eyes lingered on Bex's face for a moment longer than what was probably necessary before he gestured down to Bagman. "Let the festivities begin."

No sooner had the words left his mouth than Bagman was amplifying his voice with the Sonorous charm, to be heard over the now sizable crowd.

"Ladies and gentlemen!" he preened into his wand. "The third and final task of the Triwizard Tournament is about to begin!"

He gave a breakdown of the champions' scoring thus far; Harry and Cedric were still tied in the lead, followed closely by Viktor, and Fleur pulling up in last. The applause was uproarious for Harry, Viktor, and Cedric… but polite and subdued for Fleur. It made Bex frown, even as Cedric and Harry were given a head start into the maze – the task had begun.

But something didn't feel right.

"Something troubling you, Healer Kakudō?"

Severus' tone was low, barely above a murmur. And although she remained electrified by him, Bex couldn't shake the feeling that began crawling up her backside. She shook her head minutely, which actually appeared a lot more like she'd just jerked it to the side.

Viktor was sent next into the labyrinth, hedges obscuring any view they could hope to have of what exactly awaited him within.

"Just a feeling…" she whispered, when she still felt the weight of his gaze upon her.

"Describe it," he said, snapping back to his normal tone.

"What?"

"The feeling," he said tersely, and now his eyes were fixed on the hollow, blackened entrance of the maze, where Fleur was waiting on her mark. "Describe it."

Bex thought for a moment, considering the past couple of hours – she considered the intuitive need to keep watch, a silent guardian, over the four champions; how each one carried their own nervous energy, no one student more certain of their ability than the other. She thought about the pang in her stomach that was persisting, that twinge which had not alleviated for even a second since she walked the children down to the pitch with Ludo Bagman. This feeling, whatever it was, gnawed at her gut with a ferocity that demanded her attention. It told her that something big was going to happen. Something… perhaps more monumental than what they were prepared for.

Well, obviously, she'd chided herself. After tonight, they would know their Triwizard Champion. Still, that explanation sat, hollow in her mouth and in her mind because it didn't account for why she felt so…

"Cold." Her voice was soft, watching Fleur disappear through the pitch-black entrance. "The feeling – it's cold."

She sensed – rather than saw – his darkened eyes cut across her. He knew something. They were all now staring at the towering hedges, waiting with bated breath for the victor to emerge. None of them knowing exactly how long that would take.

Through her side conversation with Severus, Septima remained silent, but Bex knew she was listening – absorbing every word.

"Hmm," he replied at last, and he said nothing more of the matter, glancing down at Minerva and Moody circling the southeast perimeter of the maze, until they rounded the corner and vanished out of sight.

To keep the audience engaged and entertained, the Hogwarts orchestra put on a small performance; Bex found the music to be an enjoyable distraction from the eerie dead silence stretching out from the labyrinthine maze. She tapped her foot, along with her aunt, to the beat of the drum, visually tracking Minerva, who came around the corner again. Moody was not with her.

Severus wore a light scowl on his face. His eyes were narrowed as he straightened a bit in his seat. It was then that Bex realized just how taut all of the muscles in his body were. Never before had she seen him wound as tightly as this, even under absurd amounts of pressure – he seemed about to jump out of his seat, far above the hedges.

It made the twinge in her stomach grow.

After the orchestra finished their set, Bagman moved swiftly onto a small podium that was setup for him – he gestured forward a younger wizard from the stands to join his side. The wizard pulled nervously at his robes as he stepped onto the podium; his pace was unhurried.

"What a magnificent show by the Hogwarts symphony orchestra!" Bagman said into his wand. "Let's give them another round of applause, shall we?" He stirred the crowd on, then waited for the whooping and hollering to dwindle, bringing his wand back to his mouth.

"Now! Ladies and gentlemen – witches and wizards – I would like you to put your hands together once more for a very special guest who has been invited by your very own Ministry of Magic. Please welcome Mr. Ryder Lamm, a magizoologist and senior student at the Institute of Lexart."

They all clapped politely, and the young wizard smiled back at them, his hand jerking in an odd motion as if he'd forgotten how to wave.

Septima nudged Bex's leg with her knee. "Really going all-out with the entertainment factor this round, aren't they?"

Bex nodded, only half-listening to Bagman now, who was asking Lamm rapid-fire questions about the magical creatures lurking within the maze. "The underwater task was a learning experience for them, I'm thinking," she quipped.

The audience ooh'd and ahh'd over a tiny sphinx kit that Lamm was pulling from a rather large trunk. The sphinx nipped playfully at his hand, and traveled up his arm to perch on his shoulder. A few of the girls from Beauxbatons squealed in delight. The kit was less than nine weeks old, apparently, and still greatly resembled a little lion cub – no signs yet of the humanlike face that would give it its distinctive appearance once it grew to adulthood. It tucked its wings protectively and crouched low on Lamm's shoulder; as the magizoologist shared some objectively amazing facts with the crowd, the kit began to relax. Soon, it was scenting the air in curiosity.

Through it all, Severus appeared immensely bored… to the untrained eye. Bex felt an undeniable anxiety stirring inside of him, just as certainly as if she were experiencing it for herself. She wondered what he was thinking.

Suddenly, before she could bump his knee in much the same way Septima had nudged her own, there was a piercing shriek that filled the night, effectively cutting short Ryder Lamm's presentation. A hush fell over everyone – a silence so loud, it nearly echoed.

And then, not less than twenty excruciating minutes later, a stream of red sparks erupted into the sky, coming from somewhere deep within the maze.

The next few moments almost seemed to happen in slow motion. Bex leapt out of her seat, practically flying down towards the hedges as Hagrid and Minerva entered the maze; the charmed stars they wore, bright in color, allowed them to go directly where the spell was cast. The hedges shuddered and fell open for the Watchers to duck through – leaves and branches lurched like writhing insects to fill the hole as soon as Hagrid's foot disappeared out of sight.

Bex felt a rush of air at her side as she rushed out into the stadium. She glanced, and saw Severus beside her, looking quite grim. His complexion was more ashen than normal, yet his eyes flashed at her, a fierce protectiveness simmering in their depths. Even if she could somehow enter the maze under the same conditions as Minerva and Hagrid, he wouldn't let her do it alone.

"Healer Kakudō!"

Her attention was drawn to the left of the massive hedges, and rounding the corner, she met the headmaster. At his feet lay an unconscious Fleur.

Bex was by his side at once, along with a hysterical Madame Maxime. Somewhere in the stands, Gabrielle was sobbing wildly, far beyond the point of being consoled by her parents.

"It appears she was Stupefied," Dumbledore said quietly. Both he and Bex were kneeling by Fleur's head.

"By another student?" Bex's voice was sharp, juxtaposing the headmaster's lofty tone. "Is that even allowed?"

He didn't answer her – but a worried look colored his features. He stood quickly, whirling around with a "Severus –!" and leaving Bex to revive Fleur. The Healer rose to her feet, and pointed her wand at Fleur's chest.

"Renervate."

Fleur bolted upright, a lingering screech dying on her tongue. She was trembling – in much the same way as last time – although, this time, she'd not gone for a swim in frigid cold lake water.

Bex wanted to ask her which of the champions had hexed her, thus expelling her from the maze and seizing whatever chance she had at reaching the Cup – but Fleur was already being enveloped by Gabrielle. And both of them were being lifted by Madame Maxime, their parents hovering around the trio like a pair of terrified birds. Bex looked up.

The crowd appeared ill at ease. Tense.

Were they finally experiencing what she'd been feeling all along? That cold, sickening feeling, now coursing through her veins like ice? Something was wrong – amiss. But it was too late to pull the remaining students out, even if she could somehow convince the judges that it was the correct course of action. Surely someone had to be near that damn Cup by now…

Madame Maxime carefully sat both girls back on the ground, and once again, before Bex could ask Fleur who'd managed to stun her, she was being whisked up by her family to be fretted over. Maxime then turned to Bex, and began thanking the Healer profusely. Bex murmured some variant of "you're welcome," trying to not let her distaste show as Bagman continued his sportscaster-like commentary from the speaking podium.

"A pity and a shame! Let's all give a supporting round of applause for the Beauxbatons Champion!" He paused, a lopsided grin on his face. "That was no easy feat, Miss Delacour – we'll allow you to catch your breath, and bring you back up in a moment so you can detail for us your final minutes in the tournament. Now! In the meantime, while we await the return of our Watchers –"

Fortunately, they didn't have to wait another second.

Hagrid came stomping out of the maze, Minerva practically jogging to keep up with him. In his massive, treelike arms, he carried an unconscious Viktor Krum. There was an immediate uproar from the audience, and it seemed like Karkaroff was trying to compete with everyone in being the loudest of all. Hagrid ignored the commotion, seeking out Bex, who waved him down and met him halfway. She conjured a small tent for privacy, to the dismay of the news reporters and their flashing cameras. Over her dead body were they going to continue taking pictures of unconscious, vulnerable children.

She ushered Hagrid inside, and noticed Minerva was being summoned by Dumbledore; the professor was pulled into the headmaster's private conversation with Severus, who looked like he'd rather be anywhere else. He caught her eye just as she was closing the tent flap, and what she saw, flickering in the shadows of impenetrable black, rocked her to her very core.

Bex ducked backwards into the tent, where Hagrid was carefully settling the Durmstrang Champion on a cot that magically enlarged to accommodate his size.

"Foun' him in the northeast." Hagrid dried sweaty palms on his trousers. "No sign o' Harry goin' to or from… you reckon he's doin' alrigh', Miss Bex?"

She wished she could provide the reassurance he was seeking – the comfort he needed. But between the child laying before her, and the stark fear she'd seen on Severus' otherwise impassive face… she truly had no reassurance to offer.

Bex looked down at Viktor, an oddly familiar emotion blooming in her chest. She studied his face, and then looked closer. Her brow furrowed. Her jaw dropped open of its own accord, and her wand shook a bit before she steadied her hand.

"Hagrid." Her voice shifted to a perfect monotone as she removed herself from her emotions entirely. "Please go retrieve the headmaster. And Professor Snape. Quickly."

He was not gone a full minute when the tent flap was snatched open. Bex felt Severus before she saw him, lingering just out of sight in her peripheral vision. His presence would have been a comfort all on its own if she hadn't been so deeply shuttered behind the walls of Occlumency. Dumbledore came round the side of the cot, standing at Viktor's head.

"Headmaster," she began quietly. "Tell me what you see."

Dumbledore's brow furrowed in confusion, similar to the expression she'd worn moments ago. He shook his head, and she did not miss the subtle glance he threw to Severus.

"Healer Kakudō…"

"I'll tell you what I see," she continued without allowing him to finish. "I see a boy who has fallen victim to the Imperious Curse –"

"Fuck," Severus hissed.

"– an Unforgivable by your laws, if I am not mistaken, Headmaster. These.. challenges – they're supposed to have restrictions in place to prevent this exact scenario, and yet, here we are. Sir, we must find a way to pull Cedric Diggory and Harry Potter from the maze – something isn't right."

Had she not been actively Occluding, Bex's tone would've bordered on hysterical. As it stood, she had every last one of her wits about her, and her voice remained glacial. Detached.

Severus was standing next to her now, looking down at Viktor with an unreadable expression of his own.

"Imperioused?" He crossed his arms in a familiar stance he oft took when something made him uncomfortable. "How can you be certain?"

"I can see it," Bex replied, and touched a spot above Viktor's browline where she could see residual traces of the curse; though faint, it was apparent to anyone with a trained eye. "Here. And here." She moved her hand downward, hovering just above his wand arm. Severus' eyes flicked between her and the boy lying prone on the cot.

"He was Imperioused," she repeated, as if saying it again might somehow reverse that fact. "And that means there is no telling what Prior Incantato will reveal the last spells on his wand to be… where is his wand, Headmaster?"

Dumbledore's eyes cut across her, like the edge of a sword glancing off of smooth metal or glass. He tested her defenses, as he usually did, although this time with more calculation in his gaze than she was accustomed to. Bex glared down her nose at him, nostrils flaring in annoyance and outrage. They didn't have the time for this –

"Please, excuse me a moment." Dumbledore strode towards the opening of the tent with a speed that belied his old age. "Healer Kakudō, do not revive Mr. Krum until I have returned with his headmaster; Severus, stay by our matron's side, should she need anything."

To be frank, he wasn't moving an inch. Dumbledore left the unconscious Durmstrang Champion with his matron and Potions Master, intent on plucking Cornelius Fudge from his seat in the Minister's box. Bex continued staring down at Viktor – Severus continued staring at Bex. His gaze was heavy. Pressing. Finally, when she could no longer ignore it, she turned to him – her face, the blankest slate, though she could not deny the fear in her heart.

"Rebecca –"

"What do you know?"

A faint scowl flitted across his face, but it was gone as soon as it appeared.

"Frighteningly little," he answered. "I know that neither Potter nor Diggory possess the sort of temerity that would lead them to cast an Unforgivable on even their worst adversary – not on their own accord. It leaves me to believe someone is working in the shadows."

Bex paused, uncertain if now would be a good time to begin lowering her mental shield. She looked at Severus – really looked at him. Taking in just how close to her he was in proximity; taking in his eyes, locked on her, beneath which a storm brewed. There was an undercurrent of vulnerability to his stance, and it made her want to reach out her arms and draw him into her bosom. She didn't think he would mind it much.

Instead, Bex sighed, and shifted her own gaze to the tent flap. "I think the same," she said quietly, straining to hear any sign of Cedric or Harry's return. "I just cannot fathom who'd benefit from sabotaging the tournament like this."

Severus snorted lightly. "Who wouldn't benefit from ending such insubstantial fanfare? It would certainly put us all out of our misery."

"Sabotage. Not end. It only ends when the victor emerges with the goblet."

She caught his sneer from the corner of her eye, and her lip twitched upward ever so subtly. She wasn't sure what annoyed him more in this moment – that she'd just corrected him, telling him something he already knew, or that they were stuck waiting for an indeterminate length of time. In any case, the familiarity of his unrepentant irritation was almost enough to make her smile in spite of their current situation.

Almost.

When the headmaster returned, he brought with him Karkaroff, as well as Ludo Bagman and the Minister for Magic, Cornelius Fudge. It was her first time formally meeting the Minister, who was filling in for the missing Barty Crouch; and although introductions were spectacularly brief, Bex recognized with her own eyes what an utter coward the man was.

With his headmaster now present, and with Dumbledore's clearance, Bex revived the Durmstrang boy. Viktor bolted upright instantly, his eyes blinking at a furious pace. It was clear – to her, at least – that he was no longer being manipulated by the curse. And he appeared no worse for wear otherwise. In fact, he seemed rather confused and disheartened that he wasn't in the running for the championship anymore – his short-term memory lapse another obvious indicator that he was recently Imperioused.

"Well then! Now that we've seen Healer Kak – Kek –"

"Kakudō," Severus all but snarled before she could even open her mouth.

"R-right. Yes." Fudge tripped over his words, refusing to meet the eye of anyone in the small tent. How this man was ever elected, Bex did not know. He continued, "Now that we've seen to it that Mr. Krum is revived and in working order, we ought to get back to the tournament, hm?"

"Cornelius –"

"Oh, surely the wand can wait until after the tournament has concluded, Albus!" There was a vexed expression upon Fudge's face as he left the medical tent, not giving Dumbledore half the chance to respond.

The Hogwarts headmaster held a similar look of frustration (although his was accompanied by a cyclone of distaste). Still, he let the Minister go without a word to stop him. Bagman took that as his opportunity to follow behind Fudge, murmuring some incredulous nonsense about keeping the audience entertained whilst they all waited for the winner to be announced.

Viktor turned to Dumbledore. "Vot is the matter vith my vand?"

The elderly wizard pinched the bridge of his nose and breathed deeply. Then, without looking at either one of them –

"Professor Snape. Healer Kakudō. May we have the tent, please?"

His voice was rough. Angry. She'd never heard that tone from him before.

"Come."

Severus obliged the headmaster's request, gently steering Bex to the exit. His hand was placed at the small of her back, obscured from view, and dropping away completely when they were once again standing on the soft grass of the stadium. He stayed with her while they waited for Dumbledore to finish.

Minerva loitered nearby, clearly concerned and intrigued, but unable to leave her post beside the towering hedges. Cedric and Harry had still yet to return. The audience was quieted now, looking quite bored and restless while they all waited. Bex clenched her jaw as that cold, roiling feeling came back with full force to her abdomen. She scanned the stands briefly, and caught Septima's eye, indicating to her aunt that she would continue waiting for the last two students down on the pitch – anxiety was chewing away at her, and it wouldn't allow her to sit down for even a second.

She could actually go for a cigarette. Which she thought to be the most hilarious thing, considering she'd only ever smoked once in her entire life. An act that, she'd discovered at the time, was completely revolting.

Just when she was going to ask him whether or not he'd ever indulged in an occasional cigarette – for no other reason than to distract them each from their own internal monologue – Severus emitted a low hiss that was more of a forceful exhalation. His body suddenly became ever more stiff. Inflexible. His pupils were blown wide, though one could hardly tell with his obsidian eyes.

"Severus?"

He didn't answer her. Didn't even look at her.

She thought to tug on his cloak, but before she could make a move to do so, she herself was stilled by Karkaroff – violently shoving the tent flap aside with a near-feral look to him. He almost crashed right into them with how quickly he was trying to distance himself from Dumbledore.

No… not from Dumbledore, Bex thought, and before she could stop it, a panicked gasp tore itself from her lips.

Karkaroff spared only one darkly curious glance at her over his shoulder, not breaking his stride. It appeared he was fleeing, but she had no time to see whether or not he'd actually left the stadium – a vice enclosed around her wrist and all but yanked her behind the tent, out of view of the majority of onlookers.

"Stay. Here."

"Sev–"

But he was already gone, slipping by Viktor to reach Dumbledore just as the Bulgarian boy emerged from the tent. She was going to call him over – to ask him the same questions he'd likely already been asked. Then, he was swept away by his parents, and Fudge. It was clear, from the frightened murmurs rippling through the audience, that things were beginning to escalate out of the Ministry's control. And the only thing Bex needed now was answers. Bagman was no longer commentating, having run out of suitable material some time ago; instead, the orchestra played one arrangement after the next.

After just a few moments alone, both the headmaster and Severus stepped back out onto the pitch; quickly, and with purpose.

He didn't look at her. Did not even glance in her direction.

She felt as though she was beginning to suffocate watching him leave the stadium. To go – where? She wanted to cry out his name, race to him, follow him, but rather than succumb to those urges, she buried herself further beneath the mental barricade she'd so painstakingly constructed for these exact scenarios. If Cedric and Harry came out of that maze in need of medical care, they would need their matron. Here. Present. So, she watched Severus go, slipping further under the barricade with every step he took. He did not look back. Dumbledore was speaking to Fudge – there was a sense of insistence to his posture. Bex turned her attention to the sky, where multiple Ministry officials – plus Minerva – were on brooms, searching for the boys.

Fortunately, or perhaps, unfortunately – depending upon one's perspective – they would not have to search for very long.

The chaos in the minutes that followed Harry and Cedric's return would be a blur for almost everyone involved; except for Bex, who would remember everything, from Harry's heart-stopping cries to Cedric's unseeing eyes, in excruciating detail for as long as she lived.

When Harry and Amos Diggory were finally pulled off of the Hufflepuff, and when the ocean of people had been pushed back by Aurors still arriving on the scene, Bex was eventually able to briefly examine the body and pronounce Cedric… dead.

She'd conjured another small shelter around the deceased child, to give him the privacy he deserved. She asked the Diggorys for just a few moments alone with the body, while she cleaned Cedric up a bit and readied him for transport to St. Mungo's. In the back of her mind, she knew that Harry would also be needing care and attention, so she resolved herself to a quick job.

Had she not been Occluding with every ounce of her being, she'd be crying. Or, her eyes would burn a little more, at the very least. Had she not been Occluding, she'd be overwhelmed by fear and rage and frustration.

Time of death: approximately twenty-two minutes ago. Cause of death: Avada Kedavra.

A senseless death. A preventable death. The unfairness of it cut deeply into her soul. She hadn't Seen this one coming – at all – but there was still that odd feeling in her stomach at the start of the Task. That gnawing unease signaling something inherently wrong.Then there was the all-consuming awareness, the gut-wrenching realization, that the tournament, by and large, had never been truly apolitical – Fudge was very blatantly using it to project a notably false image of strength and competence to the rest of the world. And, while Dumbledore's true motivations remained well unknown, she was certain his complacency was anything but innocent. That children were competing in such dangerous games… it should have never been allowed. It should have never. Been. Allowed. And yet, it was; the bitter truth too difficult to swallow. Promises of their protection and safety came down to nothing but a delicate illusion, shattered in one instant by a single child who returned to them tragically, and irreversibly, dead.

It all could have been stopped so much sooner. They could have saved Cedric. He didn't have to suffer this fate…

"Rebecca."

She blinked, and looked up at her aunt, who was watching her closely with eyes that were weighted with grief.

"Auntie –"

"You cannot save him, my love," Septima said, stepping fully into the tent now. "He's gone."

She followed her aunt's gaze to her trembling hand, hovering just above the boy's chest. At the startling realization of what she'd almost done – or, tried to do – Bex jerked her hand back, as though singed.

"I-I'm not a necromancer, Auntie," she stuttered quietly, a bit dazed. "I wouldn't. I-"

"I know, dear heart. I know."

Bex knew her aunt so very well; she saw that Septima wanted to gather her into her plushy arms, like when she was perhaps nine years old, maybe younger. However, the Arithmancy professor just barely restrained herself, perceptive of her niece's need for space. Bex exhaled slowly through her nose, replacing the white sheet over Cedric's body and compartmentalizing her thoughts, her emotions, even further.

Harry. There was still Harry.

The two made their way, swiftly and silently, towards the castle; Bex cursing the anti-Apparition wards every step of the way. She assumed Harry – and possibly, others – would already be waiting in the Hospital Wing for her. Septima grabbed her hand and gave it a loving squeeze before announcing her intention to corral any loitering students into their dormitories – the professor then started down an adjacent corridor, going in the direction of the Grand Staircase, but came up short abruptly.

"Severus," said Bex and Septima, echoing one another; Bex's voice was tinged with relief, but her aunt's tone was one of wariness. He appeared out of the shadows, as he so often did, with the blankest look on his face that Bex had ever seen.

"Healer Kakudō," he spoke apathetically. "Your assistance is needed just off of the second floor corridor.

"…Moody's office?" Bex wondered what in Circe's name had transpired now. She could barely keep up, and in the back of her mind, she still heard Harry Potter's mournful, grief-stricken wail. (It was a sound no one would soon forget.) The boy should've been down in the infirmary, waiting for a Healer – why were they wasting time in Moody's office?

But Severus only nodded and turned on his heel, assuming she would follow.

"Wait one moment–!" Septima demanded indignantly. She put her hand up to stop Bex in her tracks, and (to Bex's shock) Severus also paused his stride. His back tensed and his hands curled into fists at his sides, but when he turned again to face them, his expression remained impassive. She noticed how he refused to meet her eye.

"There isn't time –"

"You'll make time," Septima snapped, and continued without giving him a chance to respond. "A student is dead – another possibly seriously injured – both of whom returned to us mere moments after you and Igor Karkaroff left the Quidditch Pitch. Now you want to take my niece gallivanting across the castle when she's needed most in the Hospital Wing? Something doesn't feel right about this, Snape."

They stared at one another for what seemed like far too long. Bex had been prepared to follow him without question – of course she had – thinking he would simply fill her in on the way to Moody's office. Septima clearly had her doubts, though, about his intentions as she watched him like an owl would scrutinize its surroundings for threats. Her hand was still stretched behind her, physically putting herself between him and Bex. Again, he was refusing to make direct eye contact with her, piling onto the enormous weight of confusion in Bex's chest.

"She is the only family I have left, young man," Septima said gravely, when it was clear he wasn't going to speak. There was something she left unsaid, as though it physically pained her to say the words aloud.

"I… understand," said Severus, and Septima finally allowed her arm to fall slowly. He said so much with so little, the inflections in his voice telling them that he empathized with her words in some way or another. He, too, wanted to say more but with one visible swallow, the words were gone. A shadow of something – was it sorrow? Guilt? It was also gone before Bex could discern its meaning – flickered across his face, and at last, he met her eyes.

"Minerva is waiting for us. Please…"

Bex heard nothing else – his plea would have been enough on its own, as Severus never pleaded… but she was now working under the assumption that Minerva had somehow gotten injured, and was in need of help. She hurried past her aunt, who told her that she'd be down to the infirmary after ushering the students to their dorms. She felt robotic, like she was on autopilot. Any other time, she would've grabbed Septima's hand to give it a reassuring squeeze; well below the barricade she'd made for herself, however, it wasn't even a thought. She breezed by Severus, knowing, without his guidance, exactly which way to go to get to Moody's office. He quickly fell into step beside her. His magic, that so often reached out to tentatively react with her own, remained so distant from her, she wasn't sure she could reach him even if she tried.

A hundred scenarios projected to the front of her mind, each one starring Minerva, incapacitated in some way. These projections hastened her pace until she was almost running, brain racing just as quickly to ready a treatment for every possible outcome. Severus barely made a sound as he matched her stride for stride, black robes billowing in their wake.

They were both oddly synchronized with one another, sweeping the corridors, ascending the Defense Tower. Severus maintained his silence, but, just before they entered the Defense professor's office, he stopped their way with an arm held to the door – the action was so reminiscent of her aunt's just a few minutes prior, Bex would have smirked in amusement had the situation not been so dire.

Had she not buried herself underneath a thick current of Occlusion.

He still struggled to look her in the eye now, something that was never really an issue between the two of them. But, he prevailed. With great strength, Severus prevailed, pinning her under a sidelong gaze. They glimpsed the surface of one another briefly, recognizing in each other their own need to Occlude. Dark obsidian, sharp as flint, softened ever so slightly.

"Tonight marks a turning point. Amidst all uncertainty, remember that your presence in my life – damned as it may be – is.. irreplaceable. I…" He struggled with trying to decide just how much more he should say, but Bex knew what he would've said next, had he allowed himself. She could see it flashing in his eyes – passion, yearning. Devotion.

Love.

He did not finish, and he did not give her a chance to reply – typical – shoving the door open roughly. A hundred scenarios she'd thought up, and not a single one could have prepared Bex for the scene they walked in on – a strange, unconscious wizard on the floor of Moody's office, bound by ropes and currently being guarded at wandpoint by Minerva. Her steely gaze flickered up at them only briefly before returning to keeping watch over the stranger.

"You're not hurt," Bex breathed, allowing a small drop of relief to balloon in her chest. Then, "Who the hell is this?"

"Barty Crouch." Minerva and Severus answered at the same time.

"His son," Bex said, more of a statement of fact than a question. She stepped forward warily, but before she could get too close, a heavy hand fell on her shoulder. Cool breath tickled the back of her neck.

"Minerva will explain the rest," murmured Severus. "I must go… I will come find you when I am able."

He tried to disappear, but she wouldn't let him be so quick. She grabbed his hand, fully aware that Minerva was now watching them.

"Be safe," she whispered, almost like a prayer.

Her words were received similar to a gut punch. The wretched look upon his face spoke volumes to the anguish he was experiencing, and Bex wanted to do nothing more than embrace him. Hold him in the same way he'd held her the night she brought Viktor Krum back from the brink of death. Brush her lips against the corner of his mouth; bring his head lower so she could whisper her love for him in his ear, and remind him that, above all else, he was still human.

Instead of doing any of that, she let him go.

He whisked out of Moody's office, black robes snapping at his feet. He shut the door behind him with a firm THUD.

"Bex!" Minerva snapped to grab her attention. Curiously, the professor's tone was devoid of any true annoyance, despite the seriousness of the situation. She continued speaking, gesturing across the room with one hand – the other hand still keeping a wand pointed directly at Barty Crouch Jr.

"The trunk. Look inside. Albus says he's unharmed, but should be transferred to the Hospital Wing as quickly as possible for a full examination."

Bex's brow furrowed. For the first time, she noticed the unassuming trunk – opened – on the other side of the office. She approached with caution, wand at the ready; the closer she got, the more she could feel some nasty enchantments rolling off of the thoroughly bewitched object.

Who on Earth? she thought, peering over the side.

"Oh, shit!"

RK + SS

When Bex finally managed to make it to the Hospital Wing, she stumbled upon a spectacle all too similar to the Night Circus for her liking. Harry was still nowhere to be found (she could only assume he was with the headmaster, based on what Minerva told her). Crowded in the infirmary was about a quarter of the Weasley clan, including their matriarch, and Hermione – all clearly distressed but physically uninjured.

Molly Weasley let out a small shriek at the sight of a balding, malnourished Moody being levitated on a stretcher-like cot beside Bex; she ushered the kids down a few beds, shushing their squawking and allowing the Healer some quiet to work.

Fortunately, the professor – had he even been a professor at all this school year? – didn't require much in the way of medical attention. He was suffering from hypothermia, so Bex employed some basic fire healing techniques to bring his temperature back up to normal. She also dosed him with a few potions, including some All-Nutrition – she cringed to think of how long this formidable wizard had gone without food. Water. Sunlight.

Satisfied with his prognosis, Bex at last faced Harry's friends and family. They had seemingly inched closer since she finished up treating Moody; reflexively, Bex snapped the curtain shut around his bed. The poor man had gone through enough without others craning their necks to glimpse him in such a state of deterioration.

Mrs. Weasley closed the gap, and there was now nothing she could do to keep quiet the noise erupting behind her. Bex cast a muffling charm around Moody's bed, expecting he could now achieve some decent reset… as long as he wasn't disturbed. They were all talking over one another, demanding to know Harry's whereabouts (knowledge she'd love to be privy to as well). Bex cleared her throat, loud enough to be heard over the noise, and fixed them with her best glare.

"I can't hear my own thoughts with you shouting like that," she said, crossing her arms and cocking her brow in irritation – a mannerism she'd surely picked up from Severus.

"Please, Healer Kakudō," Mrs. Weasley began, her hands over her heart, "was – is that our dear Alastor?"

Bex sighed. She nodded once. And – taking into account the widened eyes of both Ron and Hermione – added, "He will recover. He just needs time. Rest." The younger Weasley gulped audibly, his brother clapping a comforting hand on his shoulder. Hermione drew in a very even, level-headed breath for a girl her age, though her fear was also palpable. Oddly, she tilted her head to the side, as though something about Moody's condition had her perplexed. Had she worked out that she – and the rest of her peers – never met the wizard who was intended to teach Defense Against the Dark Arts this year? Perhaps. They did not call her the brightest witch of her age for nothing.

"Nevermind him, mum," said Ron, shrugging Bill's hand off of his shoulder. He exchanged a glance with Hermione. "Where's H–?"

He'd hardly gotten the query out when the large doors of the Hospital Wing were pushed open with such great force, it must have been magic. All at once, Bex was hopeful and relieved – then, upon seeing Severus was not a part of the new group, only relief remained, tasting quite stale on her tongue. Harry was battered, bruised, and his hair appeared as though he'd stuck a fork in an electrical socket. His scar stood out against a paler-than-normal complexion, and his clothes were ripped in various spots; though stained with blood, most of the skin underneath was free of any visible injury. There was a slight hobble to his walk as he limped alongside Dumbledore, a mangy black dog following close behind. Bex narrowed her eyes for a moment at the obvious Animagus, wondering exactly who was beneath the dark, scraggly fur – she didn't have time to ask before Mrs. Weasley was making a sound in her throat and rushing towards the weary boy. Dumbledore held up a hand just as Bex physically intercepted, steering Harry towards a bed not too far from (the real) Moody.

"Harry has just been through a terrible ordeal tonight," the headmaster spoke quietly. "I will not have him bombarded with questions when he's just had to relive it all for me…"

Dumbledore's words faded to the background like white noise, as Bex helped the thin, shivering boy onto a cot. First – his arm, where a clean cut had been deliberately made. Her jaw tightened, lips pressed into a line; within seconds, the skin had knit itself back together, the wound now a mere memory. His tremors, however, did not cease. His left leg continued to jut out every few moments. Pain was written across his face in excruciating detail.

The Cruciatus Curse…

Bex's stomach roiled and revolted, her hand immediately reaching out to draw the privacy curtain shut. A scuffling of footsteps; Molly Weasley scolding the children into silence once more. Bex ignored everything except for the poor boy lying prone on the cot. She bent her head low to Harry's ear.

"Harry," she murmured, "you don't have to tell me what happened, but I need to know before I help you – are you feeling any nausea along with the muscle pain?"

He nodded, misery etched in every line of his deeply furrowed brow.

This was one more time where the Occluding strategies she used in her practice became the most useful – because, rather than rounding on the headmaster to berate him for not bringing this child into the infirmary immediately, she compartmentalized like hell. She got Harry a potion for his nausea. After he'd taken the full dose, Bex whisked away the empty vial. She asked him if he would be comfortable partially undressing, and he nodded again with great effort. Once she'd helped him relax back into the pillow, she pressed her hands together and Summoned a bit of eternal fire to his bedside. She waited until her hands were saturated in flames, then placed them mere inches above his chest, allowing the fire to do most of the healing work.

His eyes squeezed shut for a moment before he breathed a small sigh of relief.

"Do you have any other injuries, Harry?" She guided the flames in the direction of nerve endings Crucio was known to affect the most.

He shook his head, a yawn tugging at his mouth.

Bex didn't even notice the dog sitting at the foot of the bed until she nearly tripped over it – him. They locked eyes for a moment, silent understanding passing between each of them. Whomever this person – Animagus – was, he cared about Harry deeply. He wouldn't interfere.

"The dog will be staying."

Sharp amber eyes flitted to the edge of the curtain, where Dumbledore lurked, watching and waiting.

"I can assure you – he's very well-trained."

"I don't doubt it," Bex answered smartly. "He can stay as long as this one is allowed to get some sleep."

Another yawn from Harry, as if to punctuate her point.

The headmaster leveled her with a calculating look, and she found – infuriatingly – that he was yet again testing the strength of her mental fortitude. He poked, retreated, prodded, retreated, and poked once more, looking for even the tiniest weak spots in her barrier. She was most dumbfounded that he wasn't even being shy about it. Of course, to the casual observer (i.e. Harry), it was simply a staring contest.

"If there is something you would like to add – or ask," she said pointedly, "then please, Headmaster, by all means…"

Suddenly, his look was one of triumph. Like he'd been considering something for a time, and had finally gotten his answer. He nodded with a sage hum, and his following words left Bex with a hollow feeling in her chest.

"Some.. Dreamless Sleep for our Harry, I think, Healer Kakudō." To Harry, he said, "I will be back to see you as soon as I have met with Fudge. You are to remain here in the Hospital Wing until the day after tomorrow – after the school has been informed of Cedric Diggory." Without another word, he was gone.

Without any further delay, Hermione, Ron, and the others rounded the curtain to finally speak to Harry. Bex was confident Mrs. Weasley would keep the children in check long enough for her to retrieve Harry's potion from her office.

Dreamless Sleep…

Did the headmaster know? If he did, it truly was beyond her now – what's done was done. And it paled in comparison to what they were currently dealing with. She didn't even want to think about the horrors Harry had witnessed tonight… wherever he'd gone – because it was clear, to Bex, at least, that Harry and Cedric had not been in the maze for a time. They'd been elsewhere. Harry carried with him a stench of earth and death-like rot. She forced herself to imagine the unimaginable, knowing it would not do to keep her eyes closed on the matter, like some.

Her fingers were almost white around the neck of the vial as she handed it to Harry. Imagining the unimaginable –

Where was Severus?

If she thought about him for too long, she would spiral and be unable to focus on her patients. So she stored all thoughts of him away in a special sort of lockbox in her mind that was reserved only for those she loved.

Once Harry was sedated and sleeping soundly, Mrs. Weasley instructed Bill to escort Ron and Hermione back to Gryffindor Tower.

"No wandering, and come right back to this Hospital Wing, William."

"Yes, mum."

Mrs. Weasley then took vigil alongside Harry's bed. Reaching into a large pocket on her fabric handbag, she withdrew a crochet project, and got to work using a combination of magic and Muggle technique. The dog, upon seeing that Harry was well and truly asleep, sank into a down position that allowed him to pop up at a moment's notice. Bex turned her attention to Moody – he was in a state of unconsciousness similar to Harry, and likely wouldn't rouse until the early hours of the morning. She fussed over his bedding a bit, making sure his leg was well-covered, and left him to rest.

When Bill returned, Bex dimmed the lighting in the infirmary with a wave of her wand.

"Would you both care for a cup of tea?"

"Thank you, dear," Mrs. Weasley said, and Bex noticed a pinch of maternal worry in her brow as she once again glanced at Harry. "Very kind of you…"

Bill flashed her a small, tired smile. "I'll take a coffee, please – if you have it, of course."

Bex wandered back to her office, her body feeling strangely numb and heavy – tingly – all at the same time. She prepared a quick tea and coffee, her movements on auto-pilot. If she paused for too long, or focused too hard, fear – the very same fear which caused Severus' pupils to blow wide outside on the Quidditch Pitch – would consume her. There was no time for that. If – If Voldemort's return was upon the wizarding world at last, war was imminent.

Suddenly, a shout. Followed by the Hospital Wing doors flying open to release a cacophony of noise throughout the infirmary. Bex scowled deeply, and abandoned the tea and coffee where it was.

What NOW?

The stone floor of the wing was wind beneath her feet as she raced out of her office. Her eyes zeroed in on the source of the racket, renewed again when the Minister of Magic demanded to speak to Dumbledore at a belligerent volume. Beside him stood Severus and Minerva, the latter of whom was matching Fudge octave for octave. Bill and Mrs. Weasley were also on their feet, attempting to quiet some of the chaos before it awoke either Harry or Moody.

Bex had only one millisecond to revel in the fact that now, at least, Severus was safe. He didn't refuse to look at her this time, his eyes lingering on her for a bit longer than was necessary before snapping his attention back to Fudge.

"The headmaster – I must see him at once –"

"Mr. Fudge," Bex hissed, "this is a Hospital Wing – I'll have you acting like it!" And before she could continue scolding him further – chew him out really good because she'd definitely detected some movement behind Harry's curtain – she was interrupted.

Dumbledore made his reappearance at last, a thunderous look upon his normally serene face as he marched down the ward.

"What is the meaning of all this – Fudge – Minerva?! – I asked you to stand guard over Barty Crouch. If he has so much as a chance –"

"The Minister" – she proclaimed his titled mockingly – "has seen to it that Mr. Crouch is no longer in need of being guarded."

A beat of silence. Then, Severus said in a low, even voice, "It appears as though Mr. Fudge felt compelled to have not only one, but two Dementors accompany him to the castle, questioning his own… personal safety even after being informed that the Death Eater responsible for tonight was in custody."

At the mention of a Dementor, vile creatures that they were, Bex physically recoiled. She now knew the reason for Minerva's righteous fury – what sort of nitwit would bring even one Dementor to a school? The risk was just too great… as evidenced by the thing going rogue and delivering its fatal Kiss to one of the only key witnesses here tonight. In the back of her mind, Bex wondered if maybe Fudge preferred it this way.

"You-Know-Who… returned? Preposterous. Come now, Dumbledore…"

Then, she thought he definitely preferred it this way.

The level of gaslighting and manipulation Fudge employed in his vehement denial that Voldemort had anything to do with Cedric Diggory's death left Bex feeling more than a little unnerved. Bewildered. Even as Severus stepped forward and revealed the Dark Mark in stark relief upon his forearm, Fudge declared them all certifiably mad – and Harry, who'd awoken, a foolish child that didn't know any better.

Bex reacted like a viper, lashing out at the Minister for so boldly denying what was (quite literally) staring him in the face.

"The fact of the matter is, Mr. Fudge," she said, arms once again crossed in front of her, "a student is dead tonight because of the Killing Curse – and Barty Crouch Jr., may have orchestrated some of this, but he did not kill Cedric Diggory directly. That is something that warrants investigation." Her lilting voice cut across the sudden hush among them, her brows scrunched together, glaring down her nose at this deplorable excuse for a wizard who would allow Lord Voldemort to rise again. She could've said more – she could've called out his character, demand he step aside as Minister to allow someone more competent, with better leadership abilities, to take up the role. That he'd brought a Dementor to a school full of children showed he cared not even a fraction for even his youngest constituents.

Her eyes flashed, telling him in no uncertain terms exactly what she was thinking.

Fudge cleared his throat and harrumphed, looking quite uncomfortable being stared at in such a manner. Then, he strode over to Harry's bed, fishing a hefty sack of gold from his pocket. He extended his arm and dropped the gold on the bedside table. He was careful to give the now growling dog a wide berth.

"Your winnings," he clipped. To Dumbledore, he said, "You'll await my owl – it should not take long." With that, he pushed his green bowler hat down on his head and turned sharply on his heel before striding out of the ward. All the while muttering to himself something about "sheer audacity" and "the recklessness of forming an alliance with giants". Everyone in the infirmary watched him go, and Harry now sat with a particularly crestfallen look upon his face. Severus yanked his sleeve back into place, a light scowl tugging at his mouth. When his eyes met her own, full of trepidation, his expression softened considerably.

And then, Dumbledore was issuing out orders. Telling Bill Weasley to contact his father at the Ministry of Magic – directing Minerva to bring Hagrid and Madame Maxime to his office. He reminded Bex of a military general, with his hard, unyielding face and commanding presence. It was clear that he intended to get well ahead of Fudge's proposed smear campaign as soon as possible. He turned to Harry next, and instructed he take the rest of his potion. Only when he was assured the boy was unconscious yet again, and the Hospital Wing had cleared out some, did Dumbledore face his matron; there was no remarkable twinkle in his eye. On the contrary, he appeared quite cold. Unforgiving.

"Healer Kakudō," he said, and she found herself standing somewhat at attention, "explain to me in no uncertain terms what you believe happened here tonight."

She was perplexed – rightly so – because hadn't Fudge just been given a very detailed summary of what transpired tonight? Then, she considered the almost earnest look on Severus' face – considered that the wizened headmaster would not ask her to clarify just for clarity's sake – and it clicked exactly what Dumbledore needed to hear her say aloud.

She stood tall. The name had never evoked fear into her heart the way it did so to many.

"Voldemort has returned."

It really was that simple.

Severus flinched violently. Molly recoiled, clasping her hands and pursing her lips. Dumbledore, however, smiled in a grave sort of way.

"You have shown great strength of character, Healer Kakudō," he said. "Not only tonight, but also over the course of the entire year in which we have come to know each other."

He was telling her right now, in no uncertain terms, that he knew about her most closely guarded secret. How? She did not know, nor did it really matter – or, that's what she told herself as alarm spread through her body like wildfire. He was privy to her addiction, and yet, he'd allowed her to stay on at a school. Why? She was too scared to look at Severus now, though she felt his heavy gaze bearing down on her.

The headmaster nodded, as though she'd spoken her thoughts aloud. "I admire such traits within a person, my dear – witch or wizard, Muggle or Squib. And it is because I've watched you overcome these challenges on your own that I wanted to ask you – are you willing to sacrifice your life to protect the ones you care for?"

"Headmaster–"

Dumbledore held up a hand, silencing Severus at once, cold blue eyes still staring squarely at the Healer in front of him. Bex stood at the beginning of a crossroads, unsure what awaited her down either path but knowing she'd eventually have to choose all the same. She took a deep breath and straightened her body to its full height.

"Yes. I am." She could not help the brief glance she threw to Severus as she spoke – his jaw was clenched, his hands curled so tightly into fists at his sides that she was sure his nails were leaving indentations on his palms.

"Then I would be pleased to invite you to join an organization dedicated to opposing Lord Voldemort – or, Tom Riddle, as he was once known – and all of his ideologies. This secret society is called the Order of the Phoenix, and it was founded by myself over a decade ago, during the First Wizarding War. The people you see in this room tonight, with the exception of our young Harry, of course, and including our canine friend, would be your fellow members. We would greatly appreciate someone with your mettle and inherent abilities on the side of the Light. Will you accept this invitation to the Order on the only condition of an Unbreakable Vow?"

Severus seemed like he would physically erupt at any moment – in fact, Bex was sure he was biting the inside of his cheek hard enough to draw blood.

"I accept."

"Step forward. Molly – would you be so kind as to do the honors of acting as witness?" Though formed as a question, it was more of a demand than a request. Both witches stepped before the headmaster, the black dog watching all of the events unfold with a keen eye.

Dumbledore extended his right hand. Bex clasped it gently, yet firmly. Molly approached the bound pair with her wand extended and wavering only slightly.

"Rebecca Kakudō," the headmaster said in a clear, commanding voice, "do you vow to stand on the side of the Light, and uphold the values of the Order of the Phoenix?"

"I do."

The first string of flames soared from the tip of Molly's wand, circling around the hands joined just below it.

"Do you vow to never reveal any secrets of the Order, even under threat of torture and death?"

"I – I do."

"Do you vow to remain faithful to the Order for as long as you shall live?"

"I do."

"Welcome then, Rebecca Kakudō, to the Order of the Phoenix. This Vow is now binding; the punishment for breaking it is death."

A chill ran down her spine, even as her hand pulsed with the warmth of the spell surrounding it. "I understand," she said with no doubt in her voice.

"Good," he replied, and released her hand. "There is still much more work to be done. And very little time. As I said previously, this room holds some of the Order's most important members. And it is now time for two of our number to recognize the other for who they are." He gestured at the Animagus sitting patiently at Harry's bedside.

As if on cue, the dog stood. Bex blinked, and the next time her eyes opened, a man had taken its place. She recognized him vaguely – there was something about his dark, shaggy hair that struck a chord within her memory. Before she could even begin sorting through the library of faces and names in her mental catalogue, Molly was releasing a shriek of surprise.

"Sirius Black!"

Bex's eyes widened. Severus' face twisted into a silent snarl. He reflexively moved closer to her, like he intended to put himself between her and Black. It wasn't necessary, however, because Dumbledore again raised his hand to cease all movement.

"What is he doing here?" snapped Severus. "At whose invitation?"

"At mine," Dumbledore said, eyes flashing dangerously at his Potions Master, but Severus wasn't backing down. "As are you, Severus. As are you all. It is time now to lay aside any differences so we're able to work effectively for the greater good."

Bex wondered what might have transpired in the two wizards' shared past, for them to be eyeing one another with a hatred unlike any she'd ever seen. The mutual hostility was so tangible, she glanced to Dumbledore, worried they might actually start throwing curses at each other. The headmaster's voice reverberated with power when he spoke.

"We haven't the time for petty squabbles." Again, he reminded Bex of an aged war veteran – tenacious and sharp. "You will shake hands. Now. You are on the same side of things."

Any chance Severus had of schooling his features went straight out the window as soon as he was ordered to make physical contact with Black. At first, his face was bewildered, looking to the headmaster in disbelief. His reluctance would've been comical had the situation been at all funny. He and Black stepped toward each other, loathing etched deeply into both of their faces. They both moved slowly, as though one expected the other to pull his wand. Instead, the two did indeed manage to shake hands (without imploding), letting go quickly – like the simple act of touching burned their flesh. They backed away – Black, nearest to Harry, and Severus, assuming a position even closer now to Bex. She noticed Molly still gave the former prisoner of Azkaban a fairly wide berth.

Dumbledore released a sharp breath – exasperated and impatient. He went to stand in the center of the small group and began speaking. He assigned another task to Black, who argued that he wouldn't get to see Harry when the latter awoke – Bex could barely get the specifics as Severus' pinky brushed the side of her hand. It sent a rush of comfort she hadn't known she needed right to her chest.

"Severus."

His pinky went away. He stood stock-still, at attention. She tried to reach him with her magic, but was met with radio silence. Black was leaving through the doors of the Hospital Wing, resuming his previous form as a dog since he was very much still a fugitive. Dumbledore's face grew ever more grim, locking eyes with his young Potions Master. They shared a look that rendered whatever food was left in her stomach completely sour.

"You know what I may ask of you."

Wait–

"If you are ready…"

I'm NOT!

"If you are prepared…"

"I am." Severus' reply came as easily as his breath.

The lump that had begun building in Bex's throat burst open, bubbling up and out of her mouth in an almost feral cry. She might've said something – some kind of word between "no" and "stop" – but she couldn't tell. He was already slipping away, trying to follow after Black without telling her so much as a goodbye. She latched onto his sleeve. The entire wing seemed to hold its breath as he first looked down at her hand clutching his shirt, then to her earnest eyes doing their best to keep traitorous tears from falling.

Finally, Severus looked to Dumbledore, who was watching the entire scene unfold with a mixture of tenuous curiosity and mild frustration.

"Headmaster, if I may…?"

His eyes bounced between the two of them a moment longer, then said brusquely, "Make it quick."

In one fluid movement, Severus detached her grasp on his sleeve and enclosed his hand around her wrist. He was leading them to her office; she allowed him, despite her feet feeling like two cement blocks. He let her go in first, then followed, and shut the door behind them. They considered one another for a split second – she, noticing his face had aged significantly just over the course of the past few hours, and he, committing to memory every last one of her features.

When she spoke, she was so proud of herself for not letting fear waver her voice.

"Will you be punished?" she asked. "For not returning to his side immediately?"

"It is… likely."

"Will he –?" Her throat closed. Damn. She was doing so well until now.

"Will he kill me?" His eyes glittered with dark amusement as if they weren't currently discussing his death. "Less likely. I am more useful to him alive than dead."

That should have made her feel somewhat better, to know that his life held enough value in his depraved master's eye that it wouldn't be snuffed out – not yet. Prior to tonight, she'd only ever dared to hope for small things. Finishing the school year without another stomachache plague sweeping through Ravenclaw Tower; completing her research assignment ahead of its deadline; traveling this summer, maybe – hopefully – to a coastal region with hundreds of wildflowers dotting the shoreline, with the wizard standing in front of her. Small things. But now…

Now?

Bex wanted to dare hope for the bigger things. She wanted it all. Moving in together – something they had once mentioned, very briefly, in passing. It was pillowtalk, but said aloud all the same. Going on holiday – to places they've never been before, and using the knowledge gained to aid their own individual pursuits and publications. Fighting. Compromising. Making up. Coming out stronger for it each time.

And, because she didn't necessarily see him as a marriage person, she would settle for a nice ring and domestic partnership… someday.

"I will never forgive Albus Dumbledore for this," she said in a choked whisper.

He didn't answer her. Instead, he stepped closer. And closer. Until he could brush a curl behind her ear and plant light kisses on her forehead, nose, lips, and cheeks. She didn't realize she was crying until he was using the pads of his thumbs to swipe her tears away.

"We each must play our part – every one of us. I will come find you… when I return."

He left, and took a small piece of her with him. She stayed behind in her office but still heard Dumbledore's soft "good luck" before the Hospital Wing's doors creaked open and shut with another reverberating THUD.

---

A/N: I loved writing this chapter for the simple fact that WE knew what was coming, didn't we, faithful readers? But our MCs did not. They had no idea. Ohh, the THRILL. The ANGST.