December 1991

Thanks to Hufflepuff having her back, and the elves stopping any of the hexed things from reaching her, Violet managed to avoid anything really bad happening until it'd been long enough for things to mostly calm down. And so, in early December — over a month since everyone first found out Sirius was innocent — Violet made the mistake of going to the toilet by herself.

She didn't think anything would happen! Nothing had happened, for weeks now. And really, it was stupid for people to take out whatever annoyed feelings they had about things that were going on on her. She didn't have anything to do with it, she was just a little kid, and also wasn't the truth about Sirius getting out, and going back and fixing all the things they hadn't dealt with in the first place, wasn't that all a good thing?! She still didn't really understand why people were being silly about all this, or why it was Violet's problem somehow. If they were angry about stuff being all different and confusing or whatever, she'd think there would be better people to be angry at than Violet. She hadn't even done anything! But she was the Girl Who Lived, and the person who set this whole thing off was her mum, so she guessed it was suddenly her fault?

Or more like, all the people responsible for the confusing stuff coming out of the Ministry were all adults, and far away — and Violet was here, and only eleven, so she was an easier person to be angry with. That's what Dora thought was going on, anyway. That was still stupid, but she guessed she could understand not wanting to bother Mum? Especially after she killed two of the people who tried to hurt her and Síomha a couple weeks ago, Violet was a lot easier of a person to try to get back at.

(Mum was scary — Violet never really forgot that, but sometimes she was reminded.)

People were still being kind of stupid about her sometimes, the Light people who didn't like her sending her funny looks or occasionally saying mean things, but, nothing had happened this whole time, so she thought it was safe? This whole thing was stupid, and she was feeling kind of guilty about people needing to keep an eye on her all the time, and she was just going to the toilet. Especially since she didn't want to force someone to leave Transfiguration with her. Other people found Transfiguration a hard class, and there were always lots of notes to take on the lecture and stuff. Not that Violet ever really needed to take notes herself — she already learned most of this with Mum, and Transfiguration was super easy for her. (She couldn't explain what she was doing that was different from everyone else, metamorphs were just cheaters like that.) She'd had too much tea with lunch, and double period classes were long, and McGonagall didn't mind Violet having to leave class for a few minutes, since she knew everything already. Sometimes she got the feeling that McGonagall was kind of annoyed by how easily Violet got all their practical lessons, but she obviously knew the material, so it was fine if she went out to the toilet for a few minutes — but that wasn't the case for her friends, who did actually have to pay attention. She didn't want to make them miss anything! So, she just asked McGonagall if she could go, and then she left, by herself.

She didn't think anything would happen. There wasn't a bathroom close to the Transfiguration class, she had to go over to the stairs, where there were more people around — it happened to be around the middle of the class, between fourth and fifth period, so there were older students moving between classes around.

Violet didn't even see the hex coming. She had no idea who cast it.

It hit her in the back, so even if she was paying attention she probably wouldn't have seen who cast it anyway. There was a little bit of an impact to it, pushing Violet's shoulders forward and making her stagger a step, and then the spell kind of popped — a little like a water balloon, maybe? From magic lessons she knew that spells that had to cross a distance before doing their thing were wrapped in something called an envelope, which triggered the spell when it detected the right kind of target, so she guessed that feeling was the envelope breaking. The spell itself was warm, and clingy, like the burrs some seedpods get, latching into her like the spikes digging into her skin, and then spreading, kind of crawling across her back and over her shoulders and down toward her hips, warm and prickly and bleh...

She could feel the magic digging into her skin, like thorns poking through, and it was unpleasant — it felt like maybe the spell was doing something to her skin, but she couldn't see her own back, so she had no idea what. But that wasn't a big deal, Violet just imagined her skin being normal, and pushed the change out. The thorns digging into her skin instantly went away, she let out a little relieved breath...but then they just came right back, stabbing their way in, in dozens and dozens of spots all over her back and shoulders and down to her hips, Violet groaned, gritting her teeth. It didn't really hurt that much, whatever the spell was doing, but it itched, and fixing it didn't work! She tried to force a change again, thinking maybe it would work this time — when the itchy burrs went away, she could tell the spell was still there, a warm feeling like the sun on her back, but kind of soaked into her skin, like it got stuck there. Maybe like what she imagined a sunburn would feel like, for people who could get sunburns.

...It had to be a hex, then. A jinx would just do an instant effect, but for a hex, the magic would stay there until it was countered somehow. (Sometimes people would also use the word for spells that did physical damage and were too dangerous for calling them "jinxes" to feel quite right, despite just being an instant effect, because words were confusing.) Because Violet was a cheater, she could morph away what the spell was doing, but the magic was still there, latched onto her, so it would just re-apply the effect, and—

Violet yelped as the burrs dug into her again, dozens and dozens of places, all over her back and shoulders and starting to stretch down her upper arms and wrap around her stomach, hey! that was itchy! There was some chatter going on from the people who'd been around at the time, but she wasn't paying attention to that, her throat going all snarly and her skin crawling, she bit her lip and squeezed her eyes closed, very consciously forcing a breath in and out. Okay. Okay. It was just a little spell, not a big deal — she didn't really feel whatever it was doing, whatever the effect was must be minor — but she couldn't morph it away, and she didn't know enough about hexes to take it off herself, so she needed to find someone to do the counter for her. She wasn't that far away from the Hospital Wing, she was sure Madam Pomfrey could help.

Right. She could make it to the Hospital Wing. She just had to start walking.

She opened her eyes — she'd been squeezing them closed long enough it was really bright — and started moving to the stairs. The Hospital Wing should be one floor up from here, and just down the hall, it wasn't very far away. She only made it a few steps before someone was trying to talk to her, but her head felt all big and foofy, the words ringing in her ears, it was hard to make sense of them. She blinked up at the people talking to her, squinting, trying to force her eyes to focus and—

Oh! They were second-years, in Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw — Violet recognised Oz right away, and then there was also Chelsea, and Eustace (his hair was pretty) and Brendan, and there were a couple other people standing around, but they were further away and she was having trouble getting her eyes to focus, her skin crawling and her head pounding. She thought they were asking if she was okay? They must have noticed the spell hit. She noticed all of them actually had their wands out, but not pointed at her — Eustace looked annoyed, glaring out around the Grand Staircase area, like he was looking out for more spells. Violet heard that all four of them were in the duelling club, but they were still only second-years, she doubted they'd be able to do much if someone was actually trying to hit her with something. Her voice wasn't really working, her throat too tight and snarly, but she just waved them off, and kept walking. The stairs weren't far away, and then to the Hospital Wing, she could make it...

The spots the burrs were digging into her itched, making her skin crawl and feeling all big and bloated and bleh, before stepping onto the stairs she paused to shift them away again. Of course they came back immediately, Violet squeezing her eyes shut and gritting her teeth as another batch of burrs dug their way into her — and she noticed they were going further, crawling up her neck and down her thighs and around her stomach, oh crap! Was the spell supposed to spread, or was her metamorph stuff doing that? That probably wasn't a good thing, but it itched so bad, she couldn't just leave them there!

Reaching for the railing, Violet noticed her hand was shaking a little, she felt all tense and hot and scritchy and bad, stiff and jittery but soft and blobby at the same time, like she was made out of a mix of knives and pudding, but she forced herself to keep moving anyway, step by step. She could make it, she could, she'd be fine. Her breath harsh and thick and sharp in her throat, her skin prickling and crawling — and the spots the spell was doing something to her, dozens and dozens of them, itching terribly, but she was trying not to think about that, just made her feel worse — and her joints hot and screaming with each move, but she went anyway, one step on the stairs, and another, and another, her shaking fingers tight on the railing, she could make it...

Violet was almost to the top of flight of stairs when she couldn't take it anymore — the itching was just awful, dozens and dozens of burrs constantly yelling at her, she had to get rid of them. She let out a sigh of relief when she shifted them away, but then they came rushing back, digging into her skin all over again, a hard tense spasm spanging through her, clutching onto the railing Violet tipped down to her knees, her head pounding and spinning, all tight and tense and squishy like she was made out of a mix of knives and pudding, her breath hot in her throat, she leaned her head against one of the posts on the bannister, the stone cool against her skin, and forced through a few breaths, thick and shaky—

She felt something touch her shoulder and she lurched away, some kind of sound forcing its way out of her tight hot throat, kind of banging her head on the bannister. The touching hurt, making the itching even worse, like hot needles poking into her, and now that she was paying attention her clothes really weren't helping, each time the cloth scritched against her she was getting little prickles of that poking feeling, but it wasn't that bad, people trying to touch her was a lot worse. She looked over her shoulder, hissing at whoever— Oh, Oz and Chelsea were following her, apparently — it was Chelsea who'd tried to touch her, standing back and holding her hands up, her face going all red.

Violet thought she looked worried. Which she guessed made sense — it didn't feel like the spell was really hurting her, it wasn't doing anything really bad whatever it was, but Violet was acting really weird. She didn't like having a spell on her, okay, it was uncomfortable. It was giving her bad autism feelings.

She managed to get herself back up to her feet after a little bit, but it wasn't easy, her limbs shivering and her body all filled with knives and pudding, her head pounding and her throat all tight and hot and snarly, hard to breathe. But she made it, a couple more steps and she was off the stairs. The Hospital Wing was, um, this way, it was on this hall right over here — close by, the Hospital Wing not too far off the Grand Staircase, so you could get to it somewhat quickly from anywhere. She felt too shaky to walk without leaning on something, and also the pounding in her head was making her dizzy, so she followed along the railing over the drop down the big open space around the Grand Staircase, until that led her to a wall, and she leaned against that to keep moving.

Eventually she had to shift away the awful itchy stabby things again, but of course they just came right back again — Violet felt a moan push its way out of her throat this time, she slumped a little against the wall, but she managed not to fall down this time.

By the time she got to the Hospital Wing she was a stiff, twitchy mess, feeling all hot and awful and tangled up inside, her head pounding, she could barely even see straight, she felt terrible. But she made it, that was the important part. She leaned against the doors, swinging open from her weight — and stumbled inside, immediately falling to her knees. Oops...

There was a shout, making her twitch, the noise echoing inside her head, ow! Oh, that was Oz — he and Chelsea were still here, they must have been following along behind her. She hadn't noticed they were sticking with her, but she guessed that was nice of them, especially because she was pretty sure her voice wouldn't be working right now. After a little bit, Madam Pomfrey came out from somewhere, and Oz and Chelsea were talking to her, Violet couldn't really follow the words, their voices burbling all echoey in her ears.

Madam Pomfrey came over and tried to pull Violet up by her arms, but the touching hurt! Flailing, Violet randomly slapped at the hands grabbing her, until Madam Pomfrey let go, and Violet flopped over onto the floor — banging her elbow on the tile, ow. But she realised Madam Pomfrey was trying to help, so once Violet caught her breath, she pushed herself up onto her feet, very dizzy, she teetered for a second. Chelsea was there, Violet caught onto her arm, but the touching hurt, so she shoved off immediately, stumbled for a couple steps, following Madam Pomfrey deeper into the room. She was led over to one of the empty beds, Madam Pomfrey saying something at her and waving at the bed — her voice was still sounding weird and bad in her ears, grinding and burbling and nonsense, but the gesture was clear enough, Violet stumbled over and plopped down to sit on the edge, and—

Ow! Sitting hurt! Why did sitting hurt?! Was like there were little things stuck under her skin, dozens and dozens of them, they itched just on their own, but putting pressure on them was all stabby, ow ow ow ow...

It was unpleasant, so Violet shifted her skin normal again...but of course they just came back a second later, ugh...

There was some gasping from Oz and Chelsea and Madam Pomfrey — it came back bigger again this time, she could feel the itchy burrs digging into her skin had stretched all the way to her face and hands, they should be able to see it easily now. Out of curiosity, Violet looked down at her hands. Her skin had gone all blotchy red and white, inflamed and itchy...boils, it was a hex that made boils. Some of them had, like, yellowish-whitish pus in them, gross...

Madam Pomfrey looked at the ones on her hands for a little bit, casting spells with her wand, which were itchy, and while she did it holding Violet's hand in the spot she wanted with her other hand, and the touching hurt, ow! But Violet realised she was just trying to help, so she tried to hold still, gritting her teeth and kicking her feet to bleed off the energy, ow ow ow ow ow...

Eventually Madam Pomfrey dropped her hand. She was saying something, but the words still weren't making sense, just blinking dumbly up at her. Whatever it was, apparently it didn't need Violet's participation — she said something to Oz and Chelsea, and they left, with final looks and muttered words to Violet, and then Madam Pomfrey said something to her, and...pulled the curtains closed around the bed, leaving her alone.

Um. Madam Pomfrey was actually going to help her, right? Maybe she needed to get some potions or something, that would make sense. Violet really hoped she was coming back soon, because these things itched, and she hated having the spell working on her, and she couldn't get it off...

It wasn't very long before Violet couldn't stand it anymore, she made her skin normal again — but of course that didn't work, they just came right back again! Ach! Groaning, she flopped back onto the bed, gritting her teeth and wrapping her arms around her middle, randomly kicking her feet at nothing, stupid stupid stupid...

The itching kept going and going, and laying down meant there were more spots that she was putting pressure on, and that was stabby! Feeling all twitchy and squishy and tangled up inside, eventually she couldn't stand it anymore, she swished up onto her feet, teetered a step before she got her balance back. Thankfully they hadn't spread to the bottoms of her feet yet, she could stand up just fine. Her clothes rubbing against the itchy spots made them worse, hot little needles poking into her skin, so she whipped her robes off over her head, and then the jumper and skirt she had on under—

Violet let out a shivery sigh of relief. Once she was naked — except her shoes and socks, but the spots hadn't spread that far yet — she actually felt much better, with her clothes not putting pressure on the itchy spots. She hopped up and down, flapping her arms a little, the cool air moving around actually felt really good...

She probably looked very silly when Madam Pomfrey came back, naked except for her shoes and covered in boils, hoping on her toes and flopping her arms, but the Healer barely reacted at all, just turned back to make sure the curtains were closed properly. There was some stuff floating around Madam Pomfrey, bandages and some potions and stuff, she started explaining what she had to do, but the words weren't really making sense, and—

Oh no, it was a topical potion! There was some goop Madam Pomfrey had, some greenish gelatinous stuff, and, the words still weren't making sense, her voice burbling in her ears, but Violet got that she was going to have to spread that stuff on her skin. She didn't know why, she was pretty sure Madam Pomfrey should just be able to cast the counter-hex and Violet could make her skin normal again? Maybe she couldn't just break the hex, because metamorph reasons? She knew spells interacted weird with metamorph magic sometimes.

It was really hard for Violet to stop herself from crying, her eyes prickling and she was pretty sure she felt her lip wobbling, bit the inside to hold it still. She just knew she was going to hate this.

Since Violet didn't really feel like sitting down right now, Madam Pomfrey decided to just start with her hands — and it was slimy! She felt herself make some kind of noise when Madam Pomfrey started spreading the stuff on, and it was awful, all goopy and sticky and blech, she was shivering and squirming, and by the time Madam Pomfrey was only like halfway up to her elbow she already thought she might be sick—

It wasn't very long before she just couldn't take it anymore, and yanked her arm away from Madam Pomfrey, but that didn't really help at all, because the stuff was still on her, and she felt all sharp and twisted but falling apart at the same time, like she was filled with knives and pudding, and she couldn't breathe, thick and hard in her throat, her skin crawling painfully hard, like it was trying to escape so hard that it was tearing itself, and her head was pounding—

And then everything went quiet.

Looking back on it, Violet would decide that Madam Pomfrey must have given her a calming potion, or something. There was a way to magic potions straight into people's stomachs, so they didn't have to actually take them — basic healer stuff, extra useful if the person was so injured they were unconscious or whatever. Or if they were flailing around making actually helping them impossible, she guessed.

She didn't put that together at the time, though. All she knew was that everything was terrible, and she hurt, she couldn't even really say where she hurt, or how, just, everything, and she couldn't even make her brain work, overwhelming, and then it all just stopped. She went floaty, and numb, like she wasn't even here. Not asleep, exactly, she was still aware, just, she couldn't even think, her brain a soft smooth empty soft cool nothing, floating away. And she didn't hurt anymore, she didn't anything anymore, she couldn't really feel her body at all. Like, nothing, she couldn't even tell if she were still standing or lying down or whatever, kind of like in the moment sometimes when she woke up but she was only partly awake, and she was in bed but she couldn't feel the blankets or anything, just a numb soft absence, floating in nothing...

Stuff came trickling back, slowly. Her head was still filled with fuzz, but eventually she noticed she was laying in bed. That was the first thing she could figure out, she was on her side, and then feelings started coming back, Madam Pomfrey was spreading the goop on her leg — she could feel her doing that, but she couldn't feel the grossness of the stuff... Or, she could feel it, but she didn't have any reaction to it at all. Like she couldn't have a reaction to it, because that would be an emotion, and her brain was too fuzzy and distant and cool and quiet right now, and couldn't do emotions at the moment.

Her brain might not be able to do emotions right now, but feeling was coming back enough for Violet to realise she had a headache. A low, hard throb behind her eyes, stretching down her neck, all tense and uncomfortable in her shoulders. She wondered if Madam Pomfrey could give her a potion for that too.

It was a little bit later, when Madam Pomfrey had her flip over face-down, so she could get at the boils and stuff on her back, that Violet realised she was crying. Her head all fluffy and empty, feelings not working, she hadn't noticed. It was kind of hard to care about that right now — it was hard to care about anything — so she just pressed her face into the pillow, and waited for Madam Pomfrey to finish fixing the stupid boils.

Crying while not feeling anything was weird. She didn't know what was going on in her head at the moment, but she didn't think she liked it.

Ooh, her headache was getting worse, if Madam Pomfrey could hurry up that'd be nice...

Got a nice short one for you this time. Woo.

One more scene for this before starting the sequel to First Contact.