A Little Knowledge

The students were encouraged to remain indoors that Sunday, despite the pleasant weather outside. There was no need to ask why. The vampire had been neither apprehended nor destroyed during the professors’ escapade in the Forbidden Forest. And by this time, everyone in the school knew exactly what was going on and many of the students were afraid, despite the fact that it had been successfully driven from the castle. Or more accurately, the girls and Martin believed, it had taken what it wanted, Zabini’s blood, and fled because it wished to do so, needing nothing further from them at the moment.

They were informed that evening at dinner that Defense Against the Dark Arts classes were canceled for the week due to the fact that Professor Knowles was indisposed and no other qualified professor could be found on such short notice. The young Ravenclaws knew better; he was a lot more than indisposed.

Sissy hung her head as she heard the news. Corinna patted her back to console her.

“He’ll be back,” she told her friend.

“Are you sure?” Sissy asked, looking up with calm eyes, but distress all too evident in her voice.

“No,” Corinna admitted. She had not had a premonition or anything since the night when Martin and Zabini were attacked. She was grateful for the respite, but it would have been nice to be able to comfort Sissy.

Her eyes drifted to the Slytherin table where the vampire-prefect was eating with his house since the sun had gone down and it was safe for him to leave the darkness of the dungeons. Zabini was technically eating alone as his house mates continued to eye him with suspicion and uneasiness, even his former friends. What greater guarantee of a hard life was there than that?

“Poor bloke,” said Martin, who sat on the other side of Corinna, noticing her gaze.

“Yeah,” she agreed quietly.

Martin risked another glance at his father at the high table. His nose was still more crooked than usual. Obviously, he had taken his sweet time before troubling the mediwitch to do something about the injury. He would most definitely catch hell from Martin's mother. Martin was certain about that. Even after more than ten years of field work, with some minor interruptions, his mum had never come home from her adventures banged up or disfigured. His father couldn’t seem to help himself.

“Ready to go back to the common room?” asked Sophia as they finished their desserts, which did not taste nearly so good that night as they all had things on their minds of a mostly unpleasant nature.

“Sure,” said Corinna, “I have loads of reading to do from last week.”

“And I still have that essay to write,” said Olivia with an apologetic wince.

Sissy remained silent, but followed them from the Great Hall. She paused when they had exited and looked up the stairs that led to the hospital wing. Then she made a decision.

“Sissy?” asked Martin, noticing that she had stopped.

“I’m going to see him,” she said in a voice that would brook no argument. “I’ll be back well before curfew,” she promised as Sophia began to open her mouth.

“Is this wise?” asked Martin with an uncomfortable look.

“Perhaps not, but this is something I must do,” she replied before turning on her heel and walking briskly away. It was obvious that they were not invited to follow. Sissy intended to make her visit alone.

Sissy was very careful when she opened the doors to the hospital wing. Those doors had seen much abuse in the previous seventy-two hours. But they were still kind enough not to creak as she let herself in and closed them soundlessly behind her. She was trembling, she realized, as she surveyed the dimly lit ward. The curtains were still blocking the windows, not that it mattered very much. A candle was glowing by a bedside near the rear of the ward, directing her to the appropriate bed.

She walked the length of the hospital wing with quiet steps, listening for any sound of the mediwitch, who had not been at dinner, possibly because of her patient. Sissy heard nothing as she approached the bed that her professor occupied. Her heart was hammering as she stood there looking down at him.

Knowles’ eyes had been bandaged. It was a mercy not to see the blood, but then her mouth went dry as she realized that it was possible that he had been permanently injured, perhaps even blinded. Nothing else seemed to be amiss. His other injuries were healed and gone. His torn and bloodstained robes had been replaced with clean hospital garments. He was perhaps a bit pallid, but that was not so abnormal as he had always seemed somewhat pale to her.

“Who goes there?” Knowles asked, startling her enough to make her gasp. He reached toward her with a grasping hand, but his reach was not sufficient to grab her. It was the second time in a day that he had surprised her. “Miss Howard, is that you?” he questioned as she took an additional backward step.

“How did you know?” she asked.

“I didn’t. I was only guessing. I couldn’t think of another student who would visit me,” he said with a bit of a smile. It was not an especially kind smile. He reached toward her a second time, straining to find her. “Miss Howard, I do not wish to speak with a disembodied voice. Please, come closer. I won’t harm you or attempt to detain you against your will,” said Knowles with a dry edge to his voice.

She stepped nearer and permitted him to grasp her arm. His grip was rather loose. He had meant what he said.

“How do you feel, sir?” she questioned.

“Very, very foolish, Miss Howard, and how are you this evening?”

“I’m ... fine, sir,” she replied.

His glib answer was not surprising to her. She hardly expected him answer her question as most people would.

“Madam Pomfrey sheered my hair off. I think she’s been wanting to do that since she arrived here,” he said, running his fingers through his substantially shorter brown hair. He trembled slightly as he lowered his hand again. The grip on her arm tightened for an instant.

“Does it hurt, professor?” asked Sissy uncertainly.

“No, but I rather fancied my long hair made me look more mysterious,” he answered. “Don’t fret, Miss Howard. Madam Pomfrey gave me something for the worst of the pain. I’m embarrassed to say that I rather needed it.” he added.

“You were very brave to go after the vampire. I don’t think you have any reason for embarrassment,” she said awkwardly. Of course, she also realized that her luck in facing the creature had been substantially better. But then, she had not run into the Forbidden Forest alone, not to mention in the middle of the night, which was both brave and foolish in nearly equal measure.

“I never even got close enough to vampire to get a good look at it, so ... rubbish,” he replied calmly. He shuddered again, but his grip remained loose. “Miss Howard, can I ask a favor of you?”

“I ... suppose,” she stammered.

“Help me get these deuced bandages off,” he requested, gesturing to those that covered his eyes.

“Madam Pomfrey would have my head if I did that, sir,” she answered, “and rightly so. I’m sure she has those bandages on there for good reason.”

“You won’t help me then?” he asked.

“I’m almost certain that I would vomit if it looked very bad ...” she admitted.

“Ugh! Then there would be a horrid smell. Very well, Miss Howard,” he said with a disgusted expression. “I can see, you know, in a manner of speaking. Flashes of color and light. Odd shapes,” he commented in an off-hand manner.

Sissy drew a deep breath as he told her that, realizing that he might very well be blind. And if he couldn’t see, how could he teach defense classes or use a wand properly?

“Maybe ...” she began in a worried voice. His hand tightened around her arm.

“Miss Howard, please refrain from becoming overly emotional. I would be quite disappointed as I have always admired your level-headedness,” he said in a strained voice.

“Yes, sir,” she replied, taking a calming breath.

His grip relaxed again. Knowles communicated almost as much through that as with his words.

“I never realized the Dark Forest was quite so dangerous, you know,” he said almost conversationally. “I had never troubled to go inside before,” he added.

“I have always doubted some of the rumors myself,” said Sissy.

“Let me attest to the fact that the more gruesome ones are true,” said Knowles with a expression look.

“The giant spiders?”

“Oh, yes.”

“Centaurs?”

“Not at all friendly.”

“Werewolves?”

“I’ve never heard that one before, but there very well might be werewolves in the forest,” he said with a puzzled expression.

“Other things?”

“Now you are just fishing, Miss Howard,” he answered. “I never considered the study of Dark Creatures very worthwhile in my field. I thought that the various Magical Creatures courses covered everything one would need to know. Apparently not so,” Knowles admitted.

“Perhaps you should consider reevaluating your curriculum then,” suggested Sissy, recalling the nuisance of searching the library for information on vampires, which were not covered with any degree of specificity in his defense textbooks.

“I believe I shall, if given the opportunity,” he answered. “Of course, I still maintain that one’s fellow wizards are the greater hazard.”

“Is that so?”

“How old were you during the war, Miss Howard?” he questioned.

“I was almost two years old when it ended,” she replied coolly, taking his meaning: that she was too young to understand the harm Dark Wizards could perpetrate against their community. In truth she could hardly remember any of it, only the celebration when it was over.

“I was involved in the fighting. It seemed like a good idea at the time, volunteering for service abroad. The qualifications for being a ‘volunteer’ Auror were relatively lax due to the mounting death tolls, even in the first years of the conflict. The muggle war took nearly as many of us as the wizarding one,” said Knowles almost as though he were telling her a story.

“One of my uncles was in the war, and he never came back,” Sissy told him, remembering the picture her mother had shown her of a dashing young wizard with flowing blond hair and the crisp, clean robes of an Auror. He too had volunteered.

“A lot of witches and wizards never returned home,” Knowles agreed in an even voice. “I had a number of near misses myself. An Unforgivable Curse passed so close to me once that I could hear it as it whizzed by in the dark.”

“It must have been ...” she began to tell him, placing her hand on top of his.

“Please, I’ve heard it before, Miss Howard. I assure you that I know it was awful or terrible or whatever you were going to say,” he said with an impatient sigh. She slowly withdrew her hand. He did not. “I had seen every horror wizarding kind can visit on each other before I was injured. I know very well what it was like.”

“Of course,” she said evenly, realizing that she had inadvertently angered him.

“Would you like to see what they did to me over there?” Knowles asked in a sharp voice with a rather odd, twisted smile.

“I ...” she stammered, wondering how she could best discourage him.

“No, wait, that’s not exactly something I can show a young lady, is it?” he said to himself. Sissy shuddered violently at all of the implications, and he laughed to himself.

“I wouldn’t know,” she managed, but her voice was slightly shrill. He was genuinely frightening her now, but she would rather faced the vampire again that let him know it.

“Miss Howard, I must apologize for that last remark. It has never been my intention to say anything so coarse in front of a student. But I simply don’t feel like myself at the moment,” he said, sobering. The laughter died upon his lips as he recovered himself.

“Quite all right,” she said tersely. “As you have said, Madam Pomfrey has given you potions. No doubt they are affecting you in undesirable ways.”

“I thank you for your indulgence,” he said with a nod in her direction. His hand immediately tightened on her arm again. “Pardon me,” he whispered.

She bit her tongue before she could ask him if he was feeling all right. Knowles would not have appreciated it.

“Perhaps you should refrain from moving about,” she told him.

“Excellent suggestion,” he replied, slowly loosening his grip.

“Or if you would prefer, I could call for Madam Pomfrey?”

“There you go with that deuced emotionalism! I don’t need a nursemaid. I only need someone to do as you are doing until the long darkness finally comes,” said Knowles in a biting tone.

“The long darkness?” she repeated with a stab of fear.

“The flashes and shapes are dying away. Soon there will be nothing ...” he answered. “But that is neither here nor there,” he sighed, inclining his chin slightly.

Suddenly Sissy realized something. Beneath the bravado, Knowles was terrified, and probably in more pain that he would ever admit, even in a jesting manner.

“I will stay then. My studies are caught up well enough,” she answered, though doing so made her almost giddy to say it. So did behaving in such an unfeeling and uncaring manner.

She was, as Knowles said, not given to emotionalism, but to be so callous made her quite ill. Sophia and Corinna in her place, she knew, would have been blubbing long ago. She merely wanted to say something comforting to him without repercussions. She wanted to tell him that he would be all right, that he wasn’t alone, that he was going to recover just fine. And Sissy knew that to say those things was beyond her power in more ways than one.

“Thank you, Miss Howard. I would not wish you to neglect them on my account. Of course, you are well ahead of your peers in defense,” he told her, giving her quite a compliment. At least it was coming from him.

“Only because ...”

“Careful,” he warned, probably thinking she was going to say thanks to his teaching, which was never her intent.

“I do research on my own when I have the time,” she concluded, raising a pale eyebrow even though he could not see it.

He arched his back slightly, and his hand became like a vice on her arm. He bit his lower lip to stifle a cry.

“Sir?” she asked with a note of panic in her voice.

“Take the bandages off,” he moaned.

“I can’t,” she replied, gritting her teeth.

“I must know! I must be sure!”

“Shall I call for Madam Pomfrey now then?” she questioned, reaching to pry his hand from her arm as it was beginning to hurt.

“She ... isn’t here. She went to St. Mungo’s for a specialist. I told her that I would be all right in the meantime,” explained Knowles.

“She left you alone?” asked Sissy incredulously.

“I was very persuasive,” he said, relaxing his grip of his own accord again. He was panting slightly, but Sissy imagined that the pain was passing, although she could not be certain of that fact. Perhaps he had merely mastered it again.

“Cyrus,” said a voice from behind her, “stop badgering the poor girl.”

She started and looked over shoulder to see Professor Dumbledore. His expression was rather stern. But the odd thing was that Sissy had not heard him enter. In fact, she could have sworn that the doors to the wing had never once opened. How long had the professor been standing there? She felt certain that he had been there for more than a few moments.

“Albus, you wouldn’t be willing to assist me with the bandages, would you?” Knowles asked.

“I would never dare disobey Poppy,” he answered, walking around to the other side of the hospital bed.

“Rubbish! She’s barely a quarter of your age! You could ... could do it easily,” said Knowles, turning his head toward Dumbledore.

“My dear boy,” said Dumbledore with a very sad, but understanding look in his eyes, “I am very sorry ...”

“Please, spare me,” snorted Knowles, forgetting Sissy for at least the moment as Dumbledore reached down and carefully lifted his other hand.

“I will wait with you if you wish as I assure you that you have scared Miss Howard nearly out of her wits,” he said.

“She isn’t frightened. Not much, anyway. She’s just like me,” objected Knowles.

“Cyrus, there is no one on earth who is at all like you,” answered Dumbledore, looking over his spectacles first at Cyrus, then at Sissy.

“Very well,” he said, releasing Sissy’s arm. “You may go, Miss Howard, as I imagine that curfew is fast approaching.”

“Are you certain, sir?” she inquired evenly.

“Quite. Good-night,” he said with a note of finality in his voice.

Sissy looked at Dumbledore for a moment, watching as he patted Knowles’ hand, squeezing it gently, but firmly in his own, and received no strenuous objection for doing so. She suddenly knew something about Knowles that astonished her as she turned and walked away from them both. Knowles had surely been a Gryffindor, and one of Professor Dumbledore’s own students. It all made perfect sense now. She nearly chuckled to herself as she exited the hospital wing and started back to the Aerie. She would have laughed, but the feeling of sadness at seeing Knowles in such a state lingered.

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