Cassiopeia's Tale

It was the strangest thing. The band kept playing songs Cass had heard many years before. Such old, sad songs. Why were they playing these at a wedding?
The band sat at the far end of the smelting room at the guild, their black dress robes making them disappear into to the shadows. Sian was wearing light pink lace, which was weird enough in itself, and throwing flowers in the air like confetti. She seemed so morbid though. When Cass came closer, she realised that tears had streaked long black rivers across Sian's face, even though she was laughing merrily.

"It'll be alright now, Cassie," she said as she threw the flowers in the air. "Look, there they are. Everything will finally be alright."

Cass turned to see Xandie and Claude standing at the far end of the smelting room. Xandie was holding a cushion with a pair of winged shackles on it. Claude was holding his arms out to her. Both of them were smiling expectantly. Cass stared at them in amazement. They were dressed for a wedding. Then the air suddenly became as think as treacle, and Cass couldn't breath.

"I can't... I don't..." she gasped, but the smiles on the men's faces never even faltered.

"You can't back out now, Cass, you're already dressed, and it cost me a fortune," Claude said kindly, still holding his arms out expectantly.

"What...?" Cass asked, looking down to see herself dressed in a very puffy white dress.

She couldn't breath, the dress was smothering her. She needed to get out, to get air, but the dress's train was wrapped around her feet, and she couldn't move. She couldn't breath, and she couldn't move. And she had to get out.
Beyond the door of the smelting room she would be free, she was sure of it. All she had to do was get to the smelting room door. But even as she lunged, she knew it was too far and that she would never make it. She would never make it, and she was falling. The dress was wrapping itself tighter and tighter around her, until she could no longer move. She screamed and screamed, but it was the end. She would never be free.

Cass' eyes flew open and she kicked madly at the sheets to get them away form her where they had wrapped tightly around her legs. Then she laid quite still, letting the cool air rush over her, struggling to make sense of what she had just seen in the room around her. Her head was throbbing and fuzzy on every detail of the night before. With her eyes closed, she could imagine that she was drifting in a very calm sea, but then the there were waves and her stomach lurched. So she opened her eyes again.

The strange scene hadn't changed. It wasn't really strange either, just all...wrong. At first glance, she recognised it as her room, but as things swam back in focus, she realised that it wasn't. Everything was all wrong. The long musty curtains were just the wrong shade of wine red, and the tarnished and dusty chandelier over her head was just the wrong shape. The white sheets looked the same, but the bed felt different, and faced the wrong way.

"What the hell...?" Cass muttered to herself, rummaging through the vague events of the previous night.

Then she sat upright so fast she almost hurt her neck. Rubbing it she looked around wildly, trying to assess the situation. It could quite possibly be disastrous. Looking down upon herself, she saw that she was still in her black ball gown, even though she couldn't feel the tightness of the corset. Cass' hands flew to her chest, blood rushing to her face. But the corset was still in place, only the laces were loosened to allow her to breathe. She took a deep breath to clear her head, but that only made hundreds of alarm bells go off in her mind.

Oh dear. This was bad. She had to get out of there. Now.
Cass leapt off the bed, pausing only to grab her shoes before she all but ran for the door. She stormed through a dark hallway and over a small sitting room toward what seemed to be the front door. She barely had time to notice all the books lining the walls like a small library, or the old gramophone player playing the songs she heard in her dream, all of which would have interested her in another situation. But now, once again, the desire to escape had filled her up like it did in the dream. She had to get out.

The door, however, was locked. She fiddled with the locks, but they wouldn't open, so she dug her wand out of her garter and tried unlocking spells on them. When they wouldn't budge she tried even more aggressive spells. After what seemed like a desperate eternity, the locks gave in and the door swung open a crack. Cass grabbed the handle and pushed hard, daylight streaming in to blind her.

Then the voice spoke in her ear, "Leaving?"

Cass felt her whole body go cold with shock. The door took it's chance and swung to again, smashing her fingers hard against the frame. She cried out and sank to the floor, clutching her hand. Her eyes watered so much with pain that tears streamed down her face.

"Give me that," the voice said, taking her fingers between it's own and feeling the bones. "It's not broken... so there's not much I can do. Only ice for the pain and swelling."

Cass blinked the tears out of her eyes to see that Severus was staring at her incredulously as he pressed her fingers between his own to ease the smarting.

"What's wrong with you?" he asked quietly.

"What...?"

"You're always getting yourself into these...situations. I'm beginning to think that if it weren't for me, you'd be dead."

Cass wiped the tears from her cheeks with her other hand and looked at him imploringly.

"I'm not like this all the time...I swear. It's just that you get to see me on bad days...I...I mean around other people I..."

At that point Cass forced her mouth shut, deciding that the situation was already bad enough without her talking to make it worse. Severus continued to look into her eyes, as if searching for an answer there. She held his gaze for a moment, and then looked down to the floor, feeling that if he stared into her eyes long enough, he was sure to see the answer. She was sure it was there for anyone to see.

This broke the spell, and he sighed and stood up. She felt arms around her waist lifting her form the floor and putting her on her feet. The he led her in the direction of the kitchen.

"You need ice...and coffee."

--o0o--

Where are we? How did we get here? And what did I do?

These were the questions that came up in the sparse conversation that was going on around the kitchen table in a brick house on Spinner's End. Cass drank the coffee and let Severus put ice on her hand, trying, but not succeeding, to die of humiliation. He must think she is such an idiot. She couldn't bear him thinking she was an idiot. She would just die. And then she hated herself for feeling that way. By the end of the cup of coffee she was so beat up over the whole thing that she had no more energy to argue with herself.

"I just really want to go home now," she sighed and got up.

When she reached the door, however, she didn't have the strength to fight with it again, so stared at it forlornly.

Severus came up behind her and put a cloak around her shoulders, but Cass shrugged it off. He tried to put it on again, but she refused, shying away form him.

"It's raining, and you will wear the cloak, Cassiopeia," he said in his most dangerous teacher's voice, and Cass, reverting to the old roles they played in Hogwarts, let him put the cloak around her.

"You will also let me take you home, and you will not complain about it," he added, but Cass saw the danger there, and protested.

"No, I'll be fine, I'll apperate right to the front door and everything will be fine," she said, pulling up the cowl over her head. "It's hardly life threatening to apperate home," she added when he remained looking unconvinced.

"Ha! Neither is going to a ball, but you seemed to have all sorts of bad luck on your side," He said, pushing her out through the door in front of him. "You could splinch yourself into a thousand pieces and then your death will be on my conscience. I don't think so. I'm coming with you."

And so they apperated together to the old three-story house in a dodgy muggle neighbourhood just off Chemic Alley. The rain poured from the roofs and pounded on the dirty cobbles. For a moment They stood in the awkward grip they took on each other in order to apperate together. Facing each other, and each holding the forearms of the other. Then Cass broke away and waved toward the house.

"Well, this is it. Um...thank you for taking care of me...again," Cass said lamely, longing to be inside, and yet unwilling to leave.

"Keep well, Cassiopeia," He said and then looked at her a while longer, his black eyes searching hers as if they looked to find again what they found there the previous night. But after a moment he turned on the spot and was gone. Cass felt as if her heart would break. What a disaster.

When she turned toward the house, she saw a curtain flick on the second floor: Claude's room.
This was really and truly a massive disaster, Cass thought as she trudged through the mud toward the front door.