I dreamed about you last night.
It wasn't the first time I've dreamed of you, that's happened before. The first time I can remember was back in fourth year, when I took over the seeker position, after that game where I made a point of keeping you busy. That one was innocent, there was nothing to it that was...shall we say, impassioned. You're fun to fly against, and I was looking forward to playing you again. I'm a little disappointed you're dropping quidditch for that reason, honestly, but I get that you're busy.
I did start having the other kind of dreams, later, almost a year ago now. I'm not sure what started the change exactly. I think the Romania tournament helped — we'd already started spending more time together, since we both joined the team, but sharing a room for a week has a different feeling to it. Learning more of each other, the little private habits, more intimate, seeing more of each other. Drifting off to sleep with a hint of your magic cool and sharp on the air, a faint tickle of your mind on my skin, hearing your breath. I didn't notice what was happening until later, but I think that was what kicked it off.
It might have been September? Maybe it was October. It was after I'd gotten the first letter back from Tonks, thanks to your playing as go-between, and you were helping me with figuring out some basic wandless magic at team practice. The thing that tipped me off was how much I looked forward to meeting up with the team, more than practising duelling was always fun to start with — and thinking about it, I realised it was because you would be there, that we would be working together. And I wanted to see you, to practise, yes, there is a thrill to trading spells with you, but also to talk to you, to simply be around you. It's hard to explain, I remember I tried to that night in Kaunas, but I enjoy just being in your presence. You have a certain way about you, a compelling intensity, always with your magic in the background, like an autumn thunderstorm on the horizon, it's energising. And you're nice to look at too, though I was trying not to do that too much, remembering what you said in Romania about being able to feel it. At that point, I was avoiding it at least partly because I knew the shape of what I was feeling, and didn't want to complicate things.
That was around when the...not so innocent dreams started. I can't count the times I've imagined crossing wands with you, only for the passion of the duel to give into passion of another kind, in the smooth unreality of dreams not knowing where one ends and the next begins. One moment, hexes on shields, sizzling and crackling, my fingers on smooth wood, and then the next lips on lips, soft and inviting, my fingers on hot skin. Not feeling any disconnect, stepping from one into the other like they were one and the same.
I do enjoy duelling, I always have, but not normally in that way — that's just you. I don't know if you ever noticed, or if you would have thought much of it even if you did. People are perverts sometimes, after all, I'm sure you see all kinds of things in people's heads.
So dreaming of you isn't new, you've come to me in sleep before, more times than I can count. But this dream was special.
I was outside, walking through the gardens in the deepest quiet of the night. It was quieter than it ever gets here, there are always some sounds you might hear from the homes scattered about, someone somewhere always up at odd hours, the crying of an infant, the calls of a dog or a goat or something, birds and bats invisible in the night. It was far too quiet, not in a heavy, suffocating way, but cool and calm and still, the moon full and bright, painting the lands all around in delicate silvery light, leaving the shadows heavy and black. The only sounds I could hear were the waves against the shore — my home is far too deep inland to be able to hear that, I don't know where that came from — and the rhythmic clacking of wood against wood.
And I could feel your magic, thick on the air, cool and sharp and thick, like a thunderstorm about to strike, rich with rain and bright with lightning, the wind energising in the same way as being around you.
I followed your magic and the sound of wood against wood, and then I was in the weaving house. It felt different than it normally does, too empty, the space open, and the silvery moonlight outdoors reached in here, the roof somehow not holding it back. There was nothing in there, except for you, sitting at a loom in the middle of the floor, intensely focussed on your work, wood clacking with each press of a pedal.
Your hair was wild, and somehow even more black than it normally is, looking less like hair than your shadow given life, thick and looming in the night. And the threads you were working into cloth were not linen or wool, the stov instead seeming to be made out of the same shadows as your hair, drawn taught by the loom, the anwe moonlight given physical form, pulled in with delicate turns of the bryddle. I think I got the image from old stories of fae arts, weaving cloth out of moonlight, that the stories say was a craft humans were taught but were lost long ago. Inspired by our talk about textiles a few days ago, maybe?
The threads glowed brightly, the bryddle shining so intensely it almost hurt to look at, washing out the shape of your fingers, but it wasn't the only thing that caught the moonlight. I doubt you noticed, you would never have reason to, but I saw it that night in Kaunas. In the darkness of the night, your skin has a way of catching what little light there is, giving you a pale, faery glow. In the dream, the glow was far more visible than it was in Kaunas, your face and hands almost seeming to shine silver, like the moon itself.
It was breathtaking. For some time I simply watched you weave cloth from moon and shadow, the moonlight on your skin almost aetherial.
At some point we left there — I didn't notice it happening, in that way dreams have of moving from one scene to the next with no in between. We were on one of those stages in the woods, that we used during the Lithuanian tournament, but we weren't fighting. It was nighttime, and it was snowing, the flakes oversized and thick, but despite the storm the moon was still bright, alive on your skin and lighting up the snow, full and glittering. I know there was music playing, but I couldn't tell you what it was. I don't think I heard it, in the moment, only the sense that there was music, vague in that way dreams can be.
Instead of using the stage for fighting, we were dancing. Your dress was black and silver and ephemeral, woven from shadow and moonlight, at once as deep as the night but bright and glittering to the eye, both of the substances put into it at once, and intense with your magic, cool and ticklish against my skin and crackling on my breath, like lightning about to strike. We held each other close, your hands in my hair and on my face, your breath hot on my throat. The fabric of your dress was odd, shadows and moonlight, while it seemed solid to the eye it was permeable to the touch, magic thick and bright and clinging and ticklish but not holding me away. My arms around your waist, I could feel your skin against mine, warm and soft under the cold sharp magic, I could trace your ribs and your spine with my fingers.
We kissed under the snow, your face glowing in the moonlight. After a time I woke in my own bed, your warmth lingering in my arms, your taste on my lips, my hands alive with the memory of your hips.
The dream was pleasant, but it only made me miss you all the more. The day I may hold you again in the waking world can't come soon enough.
So, that's how I'm feeling this morning. How are you?
Jesus Christ, Katie.
What?
̶H̶o̶w̶ ̶d̶o̶ ̶i̶t̶ ̶m̶ I'm sorry.
What for?
I have no idea how to respond to all that.
Being speechless is a fine response. As long as it's a good speechlessness.
I'm pretty sure my face is on fucking fire, how's that?
I think the only downside is I don't get to see it. You blush pretty.
Oh shut up
I can't see how you're reacting, so, do you actually want me to shut up? I can keep that kind of thought to myself next time if this was too much.
No.
No?
̶I̶t̶ ̶w̶a̶s̶ ̶n̶i̶c̶e̶ That doesn't feel like the right word somehow. It was a lot is all, and I don't know how I'm supposed to respond to it. I'm not great with this stuff.
Good speechlessness, then. Good to know.
Yeah. I kinda want to write sexy stuff, but I don't know how.
Oh? Reading about my dream left you in a sexy mood, did it?
Like I said, it was a lot. Also, Susan's sitting right there, and she's figured out that you wrote me
I guess this was the kind of thing you were talking about when you said you'd be writing me sappy love letters.
Pretty much. How did you like your first one?
It was nice. Which is still the wrong word.
Well, I'm glad I could help you wake up in a...good mood.
Shut up. And, actually I was downstairs starting breakfast when it came in, so I was already up.
Susan says hi, by the way. That's what she says out loud anyway, she's too nice to make fun of me for getting all flustered over my girlfriend writing me love letters first thing in the bloody morning.
Then go ahead and say hi for me, but I'm too nice to say you should tell her I'm jealous she's with you and I'm not.
She's sleeping in one of the guest rooms. She has a bloody bodyguard with her, she's in a different one.
I know why you felt the need to tell me that, but you didn't have to.
I just thought I'd be clear about it, just in case.
Sure. So, getting all flustered?
According to Susan's thoughts, my face is very obviously red.
I'm going to call that mission accomplished, then. But I have to go now, we're about to sit down to breakfast over here. I'll talk to you later, Liz.
Okay, talk to you later.
I don't really remember my dreams at all. Which is mostly a good thing, since I used to have a lot of nightmares. Not as much since I've been more careful with Seer stuff, but, when I wake up I mostly just remember a few flashes, and I still wake up with feelings from them. So I don't really know what dreams are like for other people, so some of the "in the way that dreams are" stuff I have to take your word on.
I'm sure I've dreamed about you before. I just get flashes and feelings though, so I don't really remember them.
I miss you too. I'll see you on the ninth.
፠
Liz had only been alone in the house for a few hours before the unexpected visitor showed up.
After Susan and the Hit Wizard tagging along with her — a quiet, serious middle-aged woman who'd hardly even said a word the whole time they'd been here — had left to return to the Boneses', Liz and Nilanse had decided to get most of the baking for the week out of the way. Planning out meals for the week, she'd been taken with a little thrill when she realised there were only six days left until the 9th. It was maybe a little silly, getting all excited and literally counting the days until she'd see Katie again, but she couldn't help it. They actually weren't going to prep any baking at all for next week, because she'd be in France with the girls on the 9th and the 10th, she might not get home until the 11th, and then her blood alchemy stuff started on the 13th, and she wouldn't be getting home again until the weekend. There wasn't really much point doing a bunch of baking ahead of time — the couple days that week she would be home, they could figure stuff out.
So, next week she'd be seeing Katie again, and she'd finally be getting the blood alchemy thing taken care of, her scars would be gone, and... Put the two together, and she guessed she had plenty of reason to be a bit jittery. She'd planned on doing some of her summer homework after they were finished with the baking for this week, but she'd been so keyed up with the excitement of the the trip to France with the girls and finally getting to the blood alchemy that she hadn't been able to concentrate. Burning off some of the energy by getting off had helped. Three times, actually, which was a lot to do at once, for her — she'd taken a long bath. She'd needed to wait a while for her hair potion stuff to properly soak in anyway, so it wasn't like she'd had anything better to do anyway.
She'd managed to wear herself out a bit, physically, but at least she wasn't so worked up she couldn't read properly anymore, which was the important thing. Coffee fixed the feeling tired problem anyway.
Of course, because her summer couldn't just be crammed full of duelling stuff, her blood alchemy stuff, and the duelling tournament, and her continuing Competency prep, there was also summer homework for her Hogwarts classes to do. The work they were given to do over the summer was mostly pretty minimal. If you averaged it out by the day, it was nowhere near the amount of work they were assigned while at school, even in the extreme cases probably only adding up to like a week's worth — she guessed the point was just so the students didn't entirely forget what they were learning while out for the holiday. But since she had shite going on this summer — and she'd want to work on Competency prep after Severus gave her practice exams, to catch up on what she missed specifically — she kind of wanted to get as much of her summer homework as she could out of the way this week. All of it done before the tournament, at the very least.
The thought had occurred to her that it didn't really matter — they weren't even given final grades in fifth year, so whether she did homework and shite didn't make any difference. She would be taking the OWLs, since she was going to be at the school anyway and she might as well — also there were legal reasons to do so since she planned to continue living in Britain, related to regulations around Secrecy enforcement, it was complicated — and those were all that mattered in fifth year. But there were a couple professors she wanted recommendation letters from, so she should at least do the homework for those classes...and if she was going to do some of it, she might as well do all of it, if only for the look of the thing. If she got a reputation for slacking off, that might affect the tone of the letters Flitwick and Babbling wrote — she'd had an excuse for not keeping up with classwork while the Triwizard Tournament had been going on, but she really didn't anymore.
Besides, her homework was at least something to keep her busy when no one else was around. Severus didn't want her leaving the house too much anyway.
Speaking of Severus, he'd be teaching her Potions class again next term. Since they had junior professors now, most of her classes last year had been passed off to the new people, but she recalled all of the established professors had decided to keep fifth-years, to make sure they were prepared for OWLs. Not just Severus, but she'd be in Flitwick's class again...and also McGonagall's, unfortunately — she didn't really like McGonagall, and the feeling was mutual.
Was that odd? looking forward to being in Severus's class again? Vitale had been fine, but Severus was...
Well, she just liked Severus, she guessed. She didn't think he was really any better of a teacher than Vitale, it was just personal. And that he would be the one collecting it was also decent motivation to actually do her summer homework for Potions, so there was that.
Now, if only some of that motivation could transfer over to, say, Transfiguration or Herbology or Astronomy, that would be great.
It was getting rather late in the evening — even a couple hours after dinner, and she and Nilanse had been eating rather late this summer — when she felt a ping on the wards, someone coming through the floo. The wards didn't immediately alert her, meaning it could only be a few people — reaching through her awareness of the wards at the back of her mind, she identified the new presence in the house as Sirius. What the hell was he doing here? He did visit sometimes, sure, there was even a bedroom that was kind of sort of his, but he always warned her before just showing up. And it was weirdly late too, the sun was even down already, in bloody July.
...His aura felt off. She couldn't read people's minds through the wards, and the extra layer of protections around her bedroom blocked her awareness from reaching that far, so she couldn't really tell much. But he did feel different, maybe agitated? Hard to say.
Frowning to herself, Liz moved to stand — she might as well go see what the hell this was about. She detoured to her closet to pick one of her casual dresses at random, since it'd be a bit awkward to meet Sirius just in her pants and a chemise. She hadn't bothered getting properly dressed after her bath just to make dinner, since it was only Nilanse, and it wasn't like she cared. If not for her desensitisation shite she'd done with Hermione, she'd never have been able to actually do that, but that was honestly very silly — by this point she literally couldn't count the times Nilanse had seen her in her underwear. Even in intensely uncomfortable situations, like when she'd been leaking period blood all over the place. Really, there was no reason to be weird about it, she could just be pointlessly neurotic about things sometimes. But Sirius was not Nilanse, she definitely needed to put on a dress at least.
Liz was partway around to the stairs when she got close enough for the magic soaked into the walls and floor to get thin enough for her to feel Sirius's mind through it. It was still vague, distorted by the floor in the way — the dining room should be almost straight under her now — but his mind felt tense, sharp and cold and...angry? worried? She couldn't quite see any thoughts, his mind held too close to himself, but...
Something happened. She could tell that much.
She'd half-expected Sirius to come find her, but for whatever reason he remained lingering in the dining room, waiting. He was in denims and an old rock band tee shirt, which wasn't unusual for him, his long curly black hair a scattered mess. While his thoughts were kept tight, his magic wasn't, hot and sharp and snapping around him, intensely enough his aura was almost visible, worked up enough that he was pacing in a tight arc back and forth across the room, his steps quick and stiff. Something had definitely happened.
"What's wrong?"
He snapped to a halt, whipping around to face her, quickly enough his hair swished about a little. Despite how obviously agitated he was, his face was blank, when he spoke his voice coming out a little tight, but without any obvious feeling on it...or maybe there was and she was just shite at reading these things, could be either. "There's been an attack. I'm supposed to—" A lurch running through him, he cut himself off, glancing away from her for a second. "Maybe you should, I don't know, sit down or something..."
That wasn't a good sign — it was obvious Sirius thought she wasn't going to react well to whatever happened. The tension was infectious, she felt nerves crawling over her shoulders, forced herself to take a breath. "Just tell me, Sirius."
He hesitated for a second, a breath hissing through his teeth, his mind almost crackling with reluctance. But eventually he said, "All right. Snape was hurt, badly. I'm here to escort you to Saint Mungo's."
Staring back at Sirius, her breath froze in her chest.
...Oh.
Yeah, she guessed she understood now why Sirius was so reluctant to tell her.
It took a moment to find her voice, her lungs not quite working, seeming too stiff while at once fragile, like a pane of glass under too much pressure, but she pushed and— "W-wh-www..." Closing her eyes, she took a long, slow breath, trying to calm down — it didn't really work very well, she could feel her fingers twitching. "What happened?"
"We don't know. We'll have to wait for him to tell us, when he gets better."
"He will? Get better."
Sirius hesitated, her breath catching sharp in her throat, feeling it coming on heavy and— "I'm not sure yet, Liz. I haven't seen him, but I'm told it's pretty bad. He's still alive, though!" he blurted out, his voice a little rushed — in reaction to something he'd caught on her face, she was aware enough of what he was thinking to catch that much. "That's... That's a good sign, with curse damage. Most of the time, if you get out of the fight alive, you have good odds. But I don't know, I'm sorry."
"...Oh." She didn't know what else to say, it was difficult to think, hard loud static filling her head and her chest tight and—
"He'll be going under, soon. The emergency healers stabilised him, but they needed to wait for a cursebreaker to... There's a lot of work to do, there's no telling how long it'll be until he wakes up again. It's, um..." He shuffled in place a little, seeming uncharacteristically awkward. "You should see him, before they start."
He didn't say to say goodbye, but that was kind of what he meant. He hadn't been lying about Severus making it this long being a good sign, but apparently the healing they would need to do was kind of a lot, and it was very possible he wouldn't make it.
The awkwardness was at least partly because he still didn't like how close Liz was with Severus. He'd been playing along, since Sirius knew he was important to her, but the two of them did not get along. And there was also a lot of guilt and self-loathing and whatever else wrapped up in there too — yeah, he hated Severus, and hated their relationship, but he also realised that it was ultimately his fault, that if he hadn't run off and gotten himself locked up in Akzaban like an idiot it would never have happened in the first place. Of course, he was also angry with Dumbledore, for sending her to the Dursleys, and then not doing his fucking job of doing something about it when they turned out to be abusive sacks of shite, so then Severus had had to take care of her, but also keep it secret out of concern that Dumbledore would intervene and do something fucking stupid, springing the scheme with their guardianship on him so he couldn't get around it, a lot of people were to blame, and really he couldn't even be angry with Severus over it, because while he did still hate his guts Severus had been the only person to fucking do anything about it, and he could tell that Liz seemed satisfied with his role in her life, at least, he was aware that she did shite like randomly floo over to his house to make him dinner (which made Sirius feel squirmy and uncomfortable in a way Liz didn't know how to put a word to), and really it'd be easier if he could just keep hating Severus in a simple uncomplicated way, and the whole thing made him uncomfortable, because he knew James would fucking flip if he knew, and there was nothing he could do about it, but after actually getting to know her there wasn't even anything he wanted to do about it, it was really the best he could have hoped for in the fucked-up mess that'd been made of her life, and he didn't know how to deal with that, and part of him wanted to be satisfied that Severus had gotten cursed halfway to hell, but he couldn't, because he knew Liz would be devastated if he died, despite everything she still seemed so fragile sometimes, emotionally-like, and he didn't know if he could—
"Liz?"
She wrenched herself out of his mind, shaking her head to herself, blinking. "Ah. I need to, ah..." Clearing her throat, she picked at the waist of her dress. "Clothes. For leaving the house." And get her bag, she didn't know how long she'd be away from home, she should...bring things...
"I'll wait here. Don't be too long." He didn't say aloud that he didn't know how much longer it would be before they put Severus under, he didn't think Liz wanted to miss seeing him, but she caught what he meant anyway.
She didn't know if she knew what he meant because she'd gotten it straight out of his mind, or if it was a Seer thing, and she just knew. She felt...weirdly scattered right now. It sure seemed like she'd gotten lost in Sirius's head a moment ago, but she hadn't even felt it happening, she hadn't meant to reach out toward him...
Her feet brought her back to her room, numb, she wasn't entirely aware of the time passing — her head thick and heavy, it was hard to breathe, she was standing in the dining room with Sirius, the house smeared by around her, and she was standing in front of her closet. She needed clothes, suitable to be seen in public. Saint Mungo's was the only proper hospital that magical Britain had, it would be busy, there would be people there. She couldn't help drawing attention, what with all the fucking stupid Girl-Who-Lived shite, but she could at least wear something that was less likely to make being stared at uncomfortable.
Severus helped out at Saint Mungo's sometime. She wondered if the cursebreaker they'd found actually knew him.
She wondered if they were as good as he was. He was primarily an alchemist, sure, but he was also a big Dark Arts nerd, they tended to call him in for weird shite nobody else knew how to handle...
Her eyes scanned over the clothes in her closet — trying not to think about the possibility that whatever she wore might become part of the memory of the last time she ever saw Severus alive, and completely failing.
She flopped down to sit on the edge of her bed, holding her head with both hands, feeling her fingers twitching, her legs weak and shaky, her throat tight and hot, and she just tried to breathe, slow and deep. Feeling like she might be sick, her stomach churning and her head spinning, she just tried to keep breathing, force herself to calm down, something cold and heavy pressing down on her, her skin crawling—
(—there was nothing she could do, it would happen no matter what, sit through the lecture, waiting for it to come, dread certainty heavy in her head and crawling over her shoulders, she could already feel the fabric of the sofa itching at her chest and the lines on her back burning in—)
Liz sucked in a harsh breath and pushed herself up to her feet, the movement taking rather more effort than it should, the dark heavy something weighing her down, slow. It was hard to focus, shaky, but she had to keep going. Clothes, she needed clothes. She wiped at her eyes — it seemed like her fingers should come away wet, her throat tight and hot, barely holding back the feelings twisting up her chest and churning in her stomach, but they didn't, for some reason — and stepped over to her closet again. Nothing fancy, comfortable, she didn't want to get stared at too much. Swapped her chemise for a vest to hide her lopsidedness, and one of her dresses made with Seer-friendly linen, simple and rather modest by modern standards, that would do fine...
She was a bit stiff, shaky, but she managed to change, stumbled over to her bag. What did she need, she, she... Her drugs, a calming potion, a nutrient potion, in case she was away overnight, um... She doubted she'd be able to focus enough to read, but she brought along a novel anyway, and, and her paired notebooks — not Rita's, she'd have to tell her later but not now, Hermione's and Katie's, and...she'd made others but just theirs for now. Did she need anything else? She couldn't think of anything, but it was difficult to think, her head thick and dark, sluggishly turning around, unfocussed.
...If she thought of anything, she could always call Nilanse. It was fine. She should go.
She stalled for a moment at the bedroom door, fingers tightly gripping the handle — her breath frozen in her throat and her stomach churning, her limbs and lips feeling weirdly numb, cold.
At the entryway downstairs, she pulled on a pair of heels — mostly just because she hadn't put on socks or anything, and she didn't need any with these, didn't want to go back upstairs — and found Sirius in the dining room again. She was still trying to get her voice to work, her throat feeling too tight and tense, when he turned around and noticed her. "There you are. All right, let's go." He glanced downward, toward her feet, then over to the hearth. "We can apparate — I know you don't like the floo, that might be easier."
Sirius wasn't keyed in to the wards as a resident, and only residents could apparate through — she nearly added him just for convenience, but it wasn't that big of a deal to walk through the garden and out the gate first. The sun had set, but recently, it hadn't gotten fully dark yet, one side of the sky still smeared with oranges and reds, starting to deepen toward violet in the opposite direction, the western faces of the scattered clouds burning. The colours jumped out at her, almost dazzling in her eyes, something trickling down her neck, the voices of some people down the street ringing in her ears, nonsense...
Once they were out on the street, Sirius held out a hand to her. She just blankly stared at it for a second before lurching to grab on. As unfocussed as she was, she kind of doubted she had the focus to help — but Sirius didn't wait for her to try, his aura flaring, sharp jittery magic crawling over her skin, and then she was being wrenched away. A brief moment of tight twisting darkness, the pressure against her eyes raising blotches of colours, and then her feet slammed down on ceramic tile. She had a second to flail for balance, the apparation leaving her feeling a little dizzy (the heels didn't help), and then the nausea struck. And her stomach had already been acting up, so that only made it worse, bubbling up her throat, odd shaky tingly weakness surging through her, suddenly feeling rather flushed. She ended up with both fists clinging onto Sirius's shirt, his hands gripping her arms under her shoulders, her knees so shaky she was barely staying on her feet, taking long deep breaths, struggling not to sick up.
She didn't know why all transportation magic had to fucking suck, but it was deeply annoying.
They were in what Liz recognised as some kind of floo room — there were multiple hearths along one wall, on the other side the white tile of the floors was interrupted with boxes outlined in red, marking holes in the wards people could apparate through. Oddly enough, the walls were partly covered with trellises holding up some kind of vines with blooming blue-purple flowers (maybe morning glory?), the bone-and-wand circled with six-pointed stars of Saint Mungo's done in shining gold at the centre of the floor. Distinctive features to help with apparation, maybe? There were a few people around, mostly going out, disappearing through the floos or popping out of existence in one of the other boxes marked on the floor. It was late, she guessed that normal visiting hours must be over by now.
Once she'd more or less collected herself, Sirius led her out of the floo room into a wide hallway, the floor in white and gold tile, the walls swirling shapes in soft blue and green. Instead of normal lights there were dozens and dozens of these floating orbs up near the ceiling, coloured yellow and red and blue and green, each of them letting off a soft glow, mixing together to more or less evenly illuminate the corridor, gently bobbing in a subtle breeze — it was weirdly pretty, but it seemed impractical, she didn't know what was up with that. Oddly, there were shop fronts here and there along the walls, selling various things, she couldn't really tell what all from here. There was what was definitely a Saint Mungo's -themed gift shop or something over here, but it looked like they'd brought in outside sellers and food stuff and whatever else too. Seemed like a weird thing to be in a hospital, but what did she know.
It was somewhat busy in here, dozens of people around, especially concentrated in a restaurant just there and a coffeeshop over here, but Liz kept her head down and just ignored them. Or tried to, anyway — it was unreasonably difficult to keep her mind close in, getting tugged this way or that by countless thoughts and feelings around her, like she was being torn apart into a dozen different pieces. She bit the inside of her cheek, hard, and focussed on putting one foot in front of the other, following Sirius down the hall.
They stepped into an elevator, much more modern-looking than the ones in the Ministry. These were fully-enclosed, to start with, without any of the rickety gates or anything, the surfaces in smooth ceramic tile, the floor and ceiling in white and the walls in green. It also felt far less cramped than the ones at the Ministry, but she guessed they'd have to, like, fit patients' beds in here, so that made sense. Sirius pressed a button, and the doors slid closed, in the same green as the walls but smooth and almost glassy. Her stomach swooped as the elevator dropped, she leaned on a hand against the wall for balance, sucking in another deep breath.
The elevator opened again into a very similar-looking hallway, though there were far fewer of the weird floating ball-lights than there had been upstairs — if anything it was brighter here, a uniform yellowish-white glow that didn't seem to come from anywhere in particular — instead of shops or whatever doors into different offices and wards and shite. It was quiet, few people around, only occasional voices and noises slipping out through doors that weren't properly closed. There was some light chatter ahead, getting louder and louder as they approached. There were signs and whatever around, but none of it was really sticking out to Liz, like going in one ear and out the other but for her eyes, words looming up and then meaninglessly slipping away. Even as dazed as she was, she saw a lot of things referencing spell and curse damage, enough to pick up the theme.
The greenish wall was broken with wood panelling ahead on the left, Sirius turned through an open double-wide doorway set into the wooden section into what was obviously a waiting room. Ahead was a receptionist's desk, wide and curved, two women sitting behind it poking away at something, on the wall behind them a big sign labelling this as the Artemis Black Curse-Breaking and Reconstitution Centre. (If that was the famous Artemis Black, the name must be old — Liz remembered she'd been the first Lady Black of Secrecy Britain, she'd died at an absurdly advanced age at some point in the 19th Century.) The walls of the room were all done in dark brown wood panelling, the floors covered with deep blue carpet, the lighting done with elemental sunlight, putting a yellowish gleam on the surface of the polished wood in places. There were a few rows of seating, chairs and small two-seat sofas, the wooden frames matching the walls and the upholstery matching the carpets.
There were people around, gathered in three clumps — one of the clumps Liz noticed immediately had familiar faces in it. There was Babbling — in a tee shirt, which was normal for her, and denim shorts, which wasn't, her curly blonde hair looking a bit more scattered than usual — who wasn't a surprise, Liz knew Severus and Babbling were friends, one of the few people on staff he actually liked. Vance was here, still in the black/silver trousers and top and vivid red cape of the Auror uniform, also not a big shock. She was a little surprised Deirdre was here, and also Lupin, for some fucking reason? They had been coworkers for a bit a year ago, she guessed, but the impression she'd gotten was that Severus and Lupin did not get along...
Síomha was also here, like Vance still in her uniform, hers the brown leather and green and yellow cloth of Saoirse Ghaelach's militia. She wasn't standing with the rest of the group, though, which kind of made sense — Liz had no idea whether she'd ever even met anyone else in the room — instead sitting in one of the chairs a short distance away. Watching the hallway leading deeper into the Centre, her arms and legs crossed, one boot bobbing in the air, her aura cool and almost unnaturally still, severely restrained.
Sirius led her over to the group, Liz stiffly following, shoulders tense and gritting her teeth. There were too many people in here, not just the group apparently here for Severus but a couple other little clumps too, adding up to a couple dozen people total. She felt too scattered right now, hard to focus, her mind getting tugged this way and that, and then attention was falling on her, she cringed away, not just the feeling of their gaze on her, hot squirming slimy prickly concern and pity, but she felt their thoughts ringing in her head too, too many voices at once, swiftly giving her a headache...
People were saying shite to her, but she wasn't really listening, the words meaninglessly burbling in her ears. She was startled out of her distracted daze when Deirdre moved to hug her, her mind suddenly intensely loud, alien thoughts and feelings thrumming through her — followed with shock and regret and squirming pity as Deirdre immediately let go and backed off a step, leaving Liz's skin crawling and tension sizzling through her and her head pounding. In the moment, Deirdre had forgotten that Liz didn't like being touched. She was a little panicky over Severus, Liz hadn't realised Deirdre gave that much of a damn what happened to him, but she guessed she had been in Slytherin with him in charge for seven years, and then had been in as a dorm supervisor over the last year, and she'd gotten the impression they got on, Deirdre even openly teasing him about things like his relationship with Síomha...and also Liz herself a bit, when she thought about it...
It was weird how many of Severus's friends were lesbians. She had no idea what was going on with that.
Liz lost track of what was going on pretty quickly, not like she was doing a great job of following people's words very well anyway. She found herself sitting in one of the chairs, without any real sense of how and when she'd gotten here, trying to breathe. She still felt tense, and hot, the knot in her throat so tight and sharp it was hard to get air through, probably the only thing that was stopping her from sicking up, as hard as her stomach was squirming, her skin crawling enough it was hard to sit still. It was hard to think straight, the minds in the room pulling her in too many directions at once...
It didn't feel quite real. It hurt, sure, unpleasant, but that was only a physical thing, little different from an ache left behind by a hex or a bad quidditch practice or something. She knew she should be feeling something, she was feeling something. She was shite at feelings stuff to begin with, and honestly it was hard for her to figure out how body-feelings and brain-feelings were connected, like, was an emotion just the physical part? She knew it wasn't, she knew there was...brain...stuff, and obviously whatever she picked up from other people wasn't physical at all, even if it sort of felt like it to her most of the time.
But mostly she just felt numb. Not physically, that was still unpleasant, but mentally — like she was standing a half a step away, here but not really here, a pall of unreality looming over her. Like this wasn't really happening, she wasn't really here, more like it was something she was just watching, distant and unimportant. And it was hard to concentrate, tugged in a dozen different directions, minds shaded with different degrees of concern and panic and nauseous dread and boredom, too many thoughts to keep straight, and none of that felt real either, confused white noise shivering through her, like fuzzy static on the tube back at the Dursleys when there was too much magic on the air, in one ear and out the other...
She hurt, and she was numb, at the same time. It didn't quite feel real, half a step removed.
Even in her daze, the memory clicked: dissociation. That's what the French Healers who'd seen Sirius had called the weird state of mind he'd been in after her parents' deaths. She remembered reading about it in the documentation at Sirius's trial, and finding the description kind of unnerving — too familiar. The way it'd looked for Sirius didn't seem quite the way it'd looked for her, but the remove, things not feeling real, not even really remembering them, it'd been close enough that she remembered making herself stop reading before she got too uncomfortable.
And she remembered, in her weird place of distant false not-calm, because she was pretty sure that's what was going on right now. Kind of like the distance imposed by her calming potions, but while that was soft and smooth and cool, almost comfortable, this seemed more jagged and tense, fragile, unbalanced, like it might come crashing down at any moment.
Like when the absent daze she drifted into sitting on the sofa while Vernon lectured at her was interrupted, the order to stand up an take off her dress bringing her crashing back to earth. Fragile, and she knew it was fragile, that it wouldn't last forever, it'd fall apart eventually, and she'd have to face whatever it was she was avoiding.
And she was even losing time, like she remembered Sirius had in his really bad episode. Short bursts, she didn't remember going up to her room, or heading back downstairs to get shoes, or most of whatever had gone on with the others earlier, or sitting in this chair. The world too far away, running on without her, she couldn't keep up, too numb, her mind being pulled in a dozen directions, alien thoughts and feelings crackling through her...
Also, her head was really starting to hurt. She didn't think her mind getting wrenched around all over the place like this was good for her, she remembered Severus explaining about fracturing...
Severus had been angry, but not really at her, exhausted. She hadn't been great at recognising that sort of thing back then — the dementor incident had been right at the beginning of third year, after that very confusing summer at his house, almost two years ago now, so much had happened since — but looking back on it it was obvious he'd been worried about her. It hadn't been obvious at the time, because he was, well, Severus about it, he was about as bad at expressing himself as she was.
Remembering had her chest clenching even tighter, sharp like slicing charms through her skin, her throat burning. It hurt.
The movements stiff and mechanical, Liz reached into her bag, and pulled out one of her tablets, tucked it under her tongue. It took a couple moments for it to kick in, struggling to breathe all the while, until she was hit with the usual wave of dizzying numbness, her head spinning, and—
Woah, okay, maybe a bad idea. The minds around weren't pulling at her anymore — she could still feel them, surrounding her, echoes of thoughts and feelings simmering through her, but the pull was gone, it was easier to think straight. Or, straight-ish, drugs. She was more herself, at least, and less other people. But she felt even more numb, her body feeling even further away, almost floating, but at the same time—
Distantly, almost like she was looking at it from the outside, she noticed how tense and jittery and hot her breath was in her throat, her fingers shivering in her lap, her skin crawling with pins and needles, sharp and energetic as though trying to leap off of her, itching to move, to do something, but she didn't know what—
But the brain-feeling felt closer all of a sudden, and it hurt, sharp and bright and loud, a heavy dark something pressing down on her making her shiver with the need to do something, but there was nothing to do—
(—his voice ringing in her ears, meaningless, there was never any point in listening, it would happen all the same, she could only sit here and wait for—)
—and her thoughts were jumping around, Severus— Suddenly she kind of wished she hadn't looked into curses so much, it made her imagination far too vivid, flashes of burns and shredded skin and bones transfigured into blades to cut up from the inside, or acid in blood burning from the inside, necrotic tissue melting away from bone like a swiftly-rotting fruit, insides dissolved into a goopy mess that leaked out of whatever orifice it could find—
She fought to stop, squinting her eyes shut and squeezing at both sides of her head with her fists (she barely felt the pull on her hair, numb), desperately trying to think about something, anything else. It only sort of worked, she couldn't stop thinking about Severus still, random memories swirling in her head, at his house or at school, a flash in Romania, dancing at the bloody Yule Ball—
What would happen if he didn't make it?
They never had dissolved the trusteeship — and she couldn't just do it herself, the whole point of the thing was that someone else was making legal decisions for her. Maybe it'd be easy to get it handed off to Sylvia or Daedalus, or she guessed maybe Sirius, but maybe someone would challenge it, and the whole stupid thing could end up in the Wizengamot again, and she'd have to deal with people trying to fuck with her, and...
She didn't know what she'd do without him.
It wasn't just the trusteeship, though that was a big problem, obviously. It was more than that. He...
(This was like when Dorea had that first seizure, but worse, she hurt.)
If he didn't make it, she didn't know what would happen to her.
Realistically, she realised she'd probably be fine...probably, assuming nobody fucked with her trusteeship. But it didn't feel like that.
She realised that was maybe just the fear talking — because that's what she was feeling right now, she might be shite with feelings things but she wasn't stupid — but it didn't feel like that. It felt like everything was falling apart, and she didn't know what to—
She thought she might be sick. She couldn't do this.
She wasn't ready, to not have him around anymore. It felt pathetic even thinking it to herself, even in the privacy of her own head, but the thought was terrifying, she couldn't breathe, her fingers shaking against her head and her lips quivering and—
It hurt, she couldn't do this. She didn't want to be here.
She couldn't do this.
There was a touch at her shoulder, occlumency shields thrumming cool and smooth against her, but she still lurched away — her elbow banged hard against the arm of the chair, numb tingles shooting up to her fingers. Crouching in front of her was Síomha, a blank look on her face Liz didn't know how to read, her mind closed up too tight to get anything from. She muttered in Gaelic, her voice smooth and soft, "They've finished preparing for the cursebreaker. We may see him, briefly. They are only letting in family — the two of us, no one else."
Severus didn't have any family. His parents were dead, and his mother's family didn't acknowledge him at all, for stupid pureblood reasons. Or, at least not publicly, but Liz was a cheater, so she knew Brendan was at least aware that Severus was his cousin (Brendan's father was Severus's mother's younger brother), even if he never said anything about it aloud. Neither of them did, even though she was sure Severus also knew that Brendan and his sister Mallory were his cousins, he treated them like any other students at the school. But then, he treated her the same as any other student when people were watching, but it didn't feel like she was missing anything going on there. She thought he would tell her if there was. And, his father's family, honestly she hadn't heard anything about them? She'd gotten the impression that they'd basically cut his father off, due to being a horrible violent drunken bastard, and Severus had just sort of fallen out of contact with them...
Also, the whole joining a movement of racist terrorists thing had probably complicated the prospect of staying in contact with his muggle family. There was that.
The trusteeship meant Severus was at least connected to the House of Potter, even if they weren't related (or at least not closely, she remembered their heritage tests), and he was officially her guardian, so she probably counted as family for the hospital's purposes for that reason. She didn't know about Síomha, though. They were obviously dating, but she didn't think that counted? like, officially? But maybe the hospital's rules didn't care about that, she didn't know, really...
"You don't need to go, if you don't want to."
She didn't want to. Her imagination was bad enough — if she saw what had been done to him, she didn't know how... She didn't think she'd deal with that well. She was already scared, and she didn't know anything, if she actually saw how bad it was...
It might be the last time she ever saw him alive.
She remembered Sirius had tried to reassure her, that he'd made it this long, if he'd managed to get away from the fight he had pretty good odds. And maybe there was some point to that, but she wasn't really sure she believed it. There were a lot of curses that took time to act, and, when people got hurt they didn't necessarily die instantly, it took time, sometimes. It was conceivable that someone could be lethally injured, live long enough to get to a hospital, the healers there managing to keep them alive for a while only for them to...not make it. Hell, there were occasionally accidents in professional duelling, despite normally having healers right there, who could respond instantly — it was rare, sure, but it still happened. And Severus's situation was far less controlled than that was, he certainly hadn't been under wards that could immediately put him into stasis if he was injured, who knew how long he...
And whatever it was that was wrong with him, they'd needed to bring in cursebreakers to help deal with it, so they wouldn't have even been able to properly heal him yet — just, keep him alive, while they waited. Even if the cursebreakers were able to break whatever magic was still affecting him, they'd need to get into the serious healing after that, and, complications happened. Healing was difficult, complicated magic, and the human body was fragile, things didn't always work out. She didn't know how bad it was, but she couldn't help the horrible thought that he might not make it.
It might be the last time she ever saw him alive, and that thought was... It was too much, too...
She didn't want to go.
She couldn't do this.
The decision to go back with Síomha to see him was never really made. She, just, found herself on her feet, already stepping into the hallway behind the receptionist's desk, with no memory of how she'd gotten from A to B. It'd just happened. There wasn't much to see in the hallway, the relatively nice furnishings of the waiting room swiftly dropping away in favour of a far more sterile environment, ceiling and floor in white and the walls in green, all done in ceramic tile. The hallway was a little overly wide, but she guessed they'd have to maneuver patients around and stuff — she remembered the door behind the receptionist's desk was more narrow, they must have some other entrance back here to bring patients in through. They were being led along by someone in white and green healer's robes, Liz didn't even remember their face, stiffy following, feeling numb and shaky, her breath harsh in her throat and her heels clicking on the tile, dread pooling cold in her stomach and her scalp and her spine itching, so tense she could barely breathe—
They came to the room too soon, the healer stepping back to let them through first. The room was open, and very clean, the surfaces in sterile white, given a faint yellowish gleam by the elemental sunlight filling the air. (Sunlight had purifying properties, she remembered.) There were some cabinets against the walls, unidentifiable equipment here and there, a bed at the centre of the room, a few healers standing a little back, muttering to each other and gesturing. There was a complicated design carved into the floor under the bed, circles and shapes and runes, difficult to read from lack of contrast, white against white — some kind of isolation wards, she assumed, to strip extraneous magic from the environment so it couldn't interfere with whatever the healers were doing. The air held a tang of alchemical cleaning products, a lot like in the Hogwarts Hospital Wing, but more intense, the fumes thick enough to cling to her throat and sting in her eyes, vaguely reminding her of scrubbing at the bloody kitchen floor with bleach...
Dimly, Liz realised she was standing in the magical equivalent of an operating room. She hadn't given much thought to what this sort of thing would look like on this side, but she guessed she wasn't really surprised that it was very plain. Except for the enchantment worked into the floor, anyway, nothing else really looked that special.
And she said standing, because she'd hitched to a stop a couple steps into the room. The enchantment in the floor must not be active at the moment, because she could feel Severus, the cool smooth texture of his mind familiar — what was unfamiliar was that his mind was completely unguarded, his aura reaching past his body, thoughts aimlessly coiling through the room in a way she didn't think she'd ever seen him do before. It kind of reminded her of what she felt like in her pensieve, except Severus's magic was warmer — not warm by any means, still cool, but less harsh about it — and smoother and calmer than hers was. She could feel him idly plucking at the minds of the healers (not grasping on, the healers' occlumency good enough to keep him out), reaching toward Liz and Síomha by the door...
He was very high, unfocussed and delirious. The healers must have him under who knew how many potions, to manage the pain from his injuries and keep him going until the curses were broken and they could fix shite properly. It didn't really feel like he was in pain, to Liz — high as fuck, and with a subtle tickling edge of panic, uncomfortable at being so vulnerable, but not in pain — so they must be doing a pretty good job of it.
The bed wasn't empty. There was a figure there, partly covered by bandages and blankets, only showing a little bit of unhealthily pale skin, a shock of black hair.
As soon as she felt him, Liz froze, unease spanging through her hot and nauseating and twisting and painfully tense. Her fingers shaking at her sides, her face numb, so tight she couldn't breathe.
She couldn't do this.
There was a touch at her back, she flinched but the hand didn't pull way, Síomha's shielded mind smooth and cool against hers. Gently pushing, the pressure on her back increased until she was forced to take a step to keep her balance, stiff and numb, she hardly even felt it. And then another, and another, as Síomha guided her toward the bed, soft and slow but unrelenting.
Liz wanted to stop, to dig in her heels, to run away, but she couldn't, too numb and stiff, her head too scattered to work up the motivation to actually do it, her eyes locked on Severus...
And then she was standing right next to the bed, looking down at him. They'd cut his hair, maybe it'd gotten caught up in whatever had happened to him or the healers had just gotten rid of it to keep it out of the way, reduced to wisps around his head only a couple inches long, visibly slick in places from sweat. His clothes were gone, she could tell because his shoulders were uncovered, but there were enough bandages and blankets and shite that she couldn't make out much more than that. By the lumps under the blankets, she got the impression that the worst of the damage was on the left side of his body, maybe from ribs to knee, but it was hard to tell, with stuff in the way.
...His left side. He'd turned his right side away from an incoming curse, to protect his wand hand. She suddenly felt very certain of that.
If that was the best option he'd had at the time, he must have been in a shite situation — multiple attackers, she thought, pinned down.
She could feel his attention on her, unusually diffuse, his eyes jumping around a little, unsteady from all the potions he was on. There was some kind of feeling on it, but she couldn't make it out, heavy and hot and...something. It was kind of a lot, honestly, she'd been avoiding his eyes, looking over hints of how badly he was hurt she could make out through the blankets. Obviously trying to get her attention — his mind a lot clearer than usual, not keeping himself contained — he said her name, but he didn't quite get the whole thing out, cutting off before the -beth, his voice thin and unsteady.
Without really meaning to, her eyes snapped over to his. She immediately noticed the white of his left eye had partially been washed out with red — there was a bandage along his jaw on that side, bruises starting to fade into existence around it, reaching up his cheek all the way to the corner of his eye. He'd been slammed into something face-first, by the look of it. (Similar to the injury she'd gotten when the portkey that'd brought her back to Hogwarts after the Dark Lord's little meeting tossed her straight into a wall, actually.) He was having a little trouble holding her gaze, eyes wavering, blinking heavily, like it was difficult to keep his eyes open. Maybe the potions, maybe the head injury, maybe just exhausted from whatever the fuck had happened, hard to say. He did feel tired, warm and heavy and numbing...
A couple moments of, just, staring, and then he said, "Don't..." his mouth working silently as his rasping voice trailed off, frowning to himself a little. Trying to concentrate, she thought, whatever they had him on making it difficult to think straight. Sluggishly, he shifted, his right hand freeing itself from under the blankets.
She hesitated for a moment before, stiff and clumsy, taking it. His hand was a bit clammy, unusually cold but also sweaty, his grip surprisingly tight, though the effort seemed to make his arm a little shaky, and his mind was suddenly very loud, unfocussed thoughts and muddled feelings battering at her. Grimacing, she squinted her eyes closed, trying to hold the noise off...
"If I don't..." He had to cut off to breath, thin and short. "...make it, don't... Don't look for them. Keep your word."
...Her truce with the Dark Lord, he meant. The words of what he'd said weren't clear, but with his mind so close to hers, uncharacteristically open, it was impossible to misunderstand.
He'd been attacked, by Death Eaters. She didn't know how that'd come about, who, he wasn't thinking about it explicitly enough. But that's why he was here. He'd gotten in a fight, he'd been outnumbered, he'd gotten away.
They'd tried to kill him. He'd gotten away.
The healers had given him more information than they had... Well, Liz hadn't spoken to the healers at all, actually, she'd heard everything she knew through Sirius. But the point was, they'd been talking to him, probably actually telling him more than they would most patients, since he was also a healer, and would understand it better — and was also a stubborn paranoid bastard, and would insist on knowing what was going on. He was pretty confident he would live, more than Sirius had been. It wasn't certain, complications were always a possibility, and cursebreaking could be very sensitive even at the best of times, but he wasn't seriously concerned he was about to die.
It was still possible, though. He was scared of that possibility, but not for himself, not because he would be dead.
He was scared for her.
He was worried that, if he died, she would do something stupid — that she would try to find who'd done this to him, and either get herself killed by them while trying to get revenge, or that the Dark Lord would take it as breaking their agreement, and she'd end up getting killed in the war, somehow.
That's what he was scared of. Because he could be about as neurotic as she was in his own ways, he really hadn't wanted to see anyone. Being injured as he was made him feel terribly vulnerable, and he knew it'd be difficult for Liz, when the healers had asked the idea had been immediately repulsive. But he'd asked to have them let in anyway, because he was worried about her, he had to...
He wasn't truly afraid of the possibility of dying — his own life wasn't important to him, not really.
Liz's was.
That she would do something stupid and get herself killed, because of him, that was more frightening to him than the prospect of being put under by the healers and never waking up again.
He'd had to have her come in, to warn her off of trying to get revenge. Because her well-being was simply more important to him than his own life.
Liz felt like she should be crying. Her throat and chest all hot and tight and twisted up, painfully sharp, impossible to breathe, she could feel her hands and her lips shaking, she was practically shivering, and it hurt, like she might shake herself apart, the tension in her chest and throat so harsh it burned, but she wasn't, her eyes squeezed shut she should be able to feel the tears trying to worm their way through, but there weren't any, despite how—
She knew she was feeling something, but it was impossible to put a word to whatever the fuck it was. It was too fucking much, though, she could tell that much.
It took a few moments, her throat and her tongue and her lips all refusing to obey her. She accidentally bit her tongue at some point, somehow. But eventually she managed to hiss out, "Yes. I... I won't. I promise."
She couldn't remember if that response made sense for the actual words Severus had said — she'd already forgotten exactly how he'd phrased it — but obviously he knew she was in his head...or he was in her head, honestly it was hard to tell at this point. Feeling the truth on it, his grip on her hand loosened a bit, and he let out a heavy sigh, his eyes fluttering closed, some of the tension dribbling out of him, making him seem even smaller somehow, thin and fragile, too pale, she could make out the veins in his neck. "Good."
Liz didn't know how long she stood there, Severus's unusually unfocussed mind swirling around hers, holding his hand. Not-crying, the pressure intense but not seeming to go anywhere, building in her chest tight and hot and too much, she could barely breathe, thin and harsh. Eventually, Síomha took her place next to the bed — she didn't notice it happening, lost time again, her hands shaking and her head pounding and her chest aching. Síomha took Severus's hand too, leaning close over him. They didn't actually say anything, out loud, but Liz could feel the edges of Síomha's mind sort of...soften? Her occlumency didn't go down, just letting Severus through...somehow, Liz wasn't sure how that worked, but she'd admit she wasn't exactly the expert in mind magic. They were having some kind of silent conversation, was the point.
After some moments, she wasn't sure how long, Síomha leaned closer over the bed. In Gaelic, she muttered, "May the purifying flame of the Mother make you whole anew." And then she kissed him on the forehead, slow and soft.
Despite the seriousness of the situation, despite how miserable she felt, Liz barely managed to hold in a burst of mad giggles — Severus felt so bemused. He understood some Gaelic, but he didn't really speak it, and that'd come out pretty weird and archaic sounding, so he probably hadn't even followed it. Liz had, a lot of traditional Gaelic blessings and stuff sounded like that, but by the feel of it Severus hadn't.
...Or maybe he was just taken aback that she'd done it at all. There was the kissing part — not like a kiss on the forehead was anything scandalous, but Severus was super private and shite, and Síomha too a bit, they hardly acted very couple-y in public — but also it was just a weird thing to do? Maybe not for the average Gaelic mage, but she hadn't realised Síomha was religious at all. In fact, she'd kind of gotten the impression she wasn't? She didn't know, it was weird, Severus had reason to react like that, but it was still weirdly funny.
And then Síomha was stepping away again, and before she realised it the healer from before was gesturing back toward the doors. A couple more people were coming into the room, and then suddenly there was a lot of chatter, the healers talking to the newcomers, and—
Liz froze.
She hadn't really wanted to come in the first place, but now that she was here, she didn't want to leave.
(She might never see Severus alive again.)
She was being ushered toward the door, Síomha's hand on her back again, but she moved slowly, her knees stiff, her heels catching on the tile. Panic clawing at her throat and crackling over her skin, but she didn't know what to do, she couldn't stay (if only because she'd get in the way), but he might— One of the times she glanced back over her shoulder, she happened to find Severus's eyes, one in the normal stark black and white and the other blotched with red, his magic coiling on the air — unfocussed and uncomfortable and exhausted, he just wanted to get this over with now, but he could feel her distress, some expression she couldn't read twitching at his lips, he pushed a feeling over at her but it didn't land very well, too unsteady to shape a proper compulsion, warm and heavy and soft—
And then they were back in the hallway, wards snapping into place as the doors closed, cutting off all sense of Severus's mind, as sudden and cold and dizzying as that time she'd nearly been swept into the Lake. She stared at the door, something simmering in her throat, but she couldn't voice whatever it was. Assuming they were words, she honestly didn't know.
They returned the way they'd come down the hall, Liz hardly taking in her surroundings, her hands shaking and her knees numb, focussed on trying to breathe through her mangled throat. She was vaguely aware of Síomha's arm loose around her shoulders, guiding her along — numb, she hardly noticed, she was more conscious of the smooth cool barrier shrouding Síomha's mind close against hers. It felt rather nice, actually, like a cold drink after intense duelling or quidditch practice, she leaned against Síomha without really thinking about it. Mentally, she meant, her mind enveloping Síomha's, coming into contact with as much of the soothing calm as she could, shamelessly, she probably would have stopped herself from doing something if she were in her right mind, but, well.
She thought she might have felt Síomha tense up, a little, but she didn't do anything about it.
Before too long they were back in the waiting room, the dozens of minds around flooding over her. And then eyes crashed against her skin — the group here for Severus, minds familiar and not — they had questions about how Severus was doing and what was going on. Which was reasonable, but it was too much, Liz couldn't keep anything straight, alien thoughts jangling in her head and words burbling in her ears...
She lost time again, finding herself sitting in a chair with no memory of how and when she'd gotten here. It must have been her chair, though, because her bag was in her lap, Liz leaning forward and hugging it to her chest with both arms — she'd lost track of her bag at some point, completely forgotten about it when they'd gone inside, she must have left it here. There were still people around, but they were leaving her alone. Some didn't want to, she could tell, throwing her the occasional glance, worried, trying to remind themselves that they had to give her space, that she wouldn't appreciate their hovering...
They'd been reminded, recently. She didn't remember doing that herself, and she honestly wasn't even sure her voice would work properly right now, throat too tangled up and face too numb — it must have been Sirius, or maybe Síomha. Or maybe she'd compelled them to behave, could be that, she really had no idea. She didn't remember how she'd gotten here.
(The only impression she had was a vague echo of warmth clinging to her shoulders, Síomha's arm tightening around her.)
She leaned further forward, pressing her face against the cloth of her bag, sucking in a thin, shuddering breath. It seemed like, when they'd been being led back out, that those had been the cursebreakers coming in. She didn't know how long it'd been (she'd lost time again), but it'd looked like they'd been quickly moving to get into it, she vaguely remembered people crowding around Severus's bed, his eyes finding hers through the figures moving around. They'd probably started already.
The only thing to do now was wait.
Liz shivered, her arms tightening around her bag. She honestly wished she could just fucking cry already, to get it out, but it wasn't coming, the pressure building to a harsh burn.
She didn't know if she could do this.