Accidents of Circumstance

Chapter 6: The Standing Stones

There is a perversion of a spell that winds up manifesting your nightmares. Draco knows this because he managed to use it while trying to help Goyle in the middle of a nightmare. He couldn't completely remember the spell his mother had used to make his nightmare slide into a pleasant dream, and instead wound up helping Goyle banish bloody-toothed jackrabbits hellbent on eating them alive. If anything, vanquishing the real thing had helped Goyle get over his nightmare. It also gave Draco a new spell to play with.

When Regina's attention was directed to the other side of the room, talking about overcoming the fear inherent in wandless magic for potentially dangerous spells, Draco went into action. He pointed his wand at Regina's back and whispered "Imbrium noctem."

Regina stiffened, mouth hanging open. She skittered backwards a few steps, her knees unable to bend. She was seeing something not there, though Draco could have sworn he saw a shadow pass out of the corner of his eye speeding for the doorway. Regina caught her voice, and suddenly shouted "Gare shi'ana tae hira!"

The shadow disappeared, but Regina burst into flames.

The younger students began screaming, and Regina staggered, falling into her desk. The desk wasn't lighting on fire, and her clothes weren't burning either. It was a magical fire that was blistering her skin, turning the surface to ash.

"Karie tan fortem!" Regina gasped. Whatever that spell was, it wasn't working. Her voice began to spiral up into a scream. "Jurak karite! Jurak kuranal! Jurak kuranal!"

Draco hastily ended the spell. How was he supposed to know? She had last had a nightmare of strange shadows and fire burning her skin to ash. How could he know she had such violent dreams?

Regina's head whipped around to face Draco, eyes blazing with fury. The ash settled off of her skin and onto the desk she was still draped over. She was panting, trying to catch her breath. "Detention for a week, Draco. Fifty points from Slytherin. Fuck, Draco, what the hell were you doing?" she shrieked.

Draco felt his throat close up around his voice. "Something stupid," he finally managed to squeak. The fury in her eyes dimmed slightly, but she was still angry.

"Come here straight after dinner, Draco. I'll know if you delay."

He didn't touch his wand for the rest of the day.

***

Draco had to write a three foot long essay on why creating spells without underlying knowledge of magic was dangerous. He also had to write three feet on why he was never going to attempt that spell again. Then he was going to write three feet on why harming others was never a good solution to life's problems.

Regina left her office after charming the classroom. It would sound an alarm if he tried to leave before all three essays were done. He sped through the essays, having written something similar in his head all day long. He knew he was sorry for the pain he had caused, but also knew that he would probably do it again if he had the day to repeat. He had needed his out, and now he had a week's worth of detentions, keeping him far away from Death Eater activity.

Draco slipped through the hallways to speak to Regina. Mabel Winningham had tried to say something, but he had pulled open the portrait doorway saying "I'm expected!" and opened the inner door. It was something of a lie, Regina hadn't known he was coming that night. But she always had an open invitation for him to talk to her, and he knew that Harry wasn't set to learn runes until later that night. He wanted to explain about the spell he had cast in her class, and to apologize for the agony he had put her through. He had never meant to hurt her. Writing an essay was her idea of punishment, but he wanted to apologize in person.

She wasn't alone. Draco ducked behind the chalkboard set up to the right of the doorway, in front of the entertainment system. He peeked at who she was talking to, just at the threshold of her bedroom.

Snape. He was holding onto her upper arms, and was giving her a little shake. She was looking pretty angry, and he couldn't make out what she was saying.

Then Snape kissed her.

Draco watched in shock as Regina began to respond for a second, then pushed him away angrily. "This isn't some game, Severus!" Regina spat. "This isn't something you can just kiss away and make it all better!"

Snape's response was low-pitched, just for her ears. "It doesn't have to be over."

"You should go now," Regina said.

Silently, Snape turned, his face more sour and sullen than usual. Draco ducked behind the chalkboard again, hoping Snape wouldn't see him. But Snape closed the door behind him quietly, and Draco breathed a sigh of relief. He stepped out from the chalkboard and saw Regina flop down on her bed, sobbing.

Not knowing what to do, Draco stood there for a moment. His chest hurt something awful to see her cry. Maybe he could say something or do something to make it better? But really, what could he say? What could he do for her that she would accept?

Draco slunk out of her room without her seeing. As he was right now, he was just another problem student. She wouldn't accept him as he was; he wasn't worthy. And he knew already that this whole situation was somewhere far out of his league.

The pain in his chest refused to go away.

***

An owl arrived for Regina some two weeks after Draco had come into her room at night, wanting her opinion about becoming a Death Eater. They hadn't spoken of it since.

Regina opened up the tiny square of parchment, absently petting the owl. It was one of the school owls, she noted, and it flew away, back toward the owlery. Ignoring the quizzical stares of her fellow teachers, she read the note.

Regina,

I've made up my mind, but I didn't want to interrupt you tutoring Potter.

I'm prepared to suffer any consequences of my actions.

Draco.

Regina glanced a look at the Slytherin table, a soft smile on her lips. She folded up the slip of paper and shoved it inside of her shirt. Draco was studiously ignoring her, yet following her actions out of the corner of his eye. She raised her goblet of orange juice a tad higher than necessary, a silent toast, and drank deeply.

Draco sighed with relief, and went back to bossing around Crabbe and Goyle.

"What are you doing, Regina?" McGonagall asked. It was on every teacher's mind, knowing full well that Regina never received owls, but magicked cell phone calls. They didn't know what an owl message would be about, especially one that would make her smile so mysteriously, and mock salute the populace. Most of the students were oblivious, but that meant absolutely nothing.

Regina turned to meet McGonagall's startled gaze. "Apparently I have a larger influence than I thought."

"I certainly hope you take that into consideration as you teach."

"I've always wanted to make a difference," she replied softly. "It just always comes as a surprise when I manage to shift history."

McGonagall couldn't get her to explain the cryptic comment.

***

The field trip was earlier than Regina had originally planned for, at the beginning of March rather than the middle of the month. The entire Alternative Magic class was going, plus a few stragglers who had pleaded with Regina to accompany their friends. There were forty-seven students total, all guided by Regina, McGonagall and Flitwick. There were three portkeys set up to take the teachers and their bunches of students to Stonehenge, then to the Invisible Circle Stones, then back to Hogwarts. If there were any problems, the teacher in question only had to shout "Hogwarts!" and the Invisible Circle Stones site would be skipped.

There was a museum at Stonehenge, but Regina was bypassing it in favor of lecturing about early magic held in standing stone circles. Some of the students had groaned, thinking it was a free day, and Hermione had dutifully taken a notebook out of her robes and a quill with a self-inking charm on it. She copied down every word of Regina's impromptu speech, a rapt expression on her face. Regina apparently not only knew the reasoning behind the various functions of Stonehenge, she was translating the hidden scripts embedded within the stones. She had touched each one and said a single word of power - no one could actually hear what that word was - and the scripts had lit up with a soft glow.

There was a glamour within the stones that kept everyone hidden from Muggle eyes, so there was really no need to be secretive about their magic. Still, it was a surprise when Regina pointed to one particular stone. "This one, dedicated to the healing arts, was often visited. Many rites were performed at the foot of this stone, in that particular depression." Regina hopped down into the depression she had been talking about, which had only appeared along with the glowing script on the stones. "The thing is, if you read the script, this stone isn't for healing at all. The stone says, once you translate it into Modern English, 'Here I receive the offering of blood to cleanse the wounds of the Son and permit the Mother to continue the cycle. Here I receive the offering of flesh to permit the fruit of the Earth.'"

There was silence as Regina picked up a handful of the reddish clay dirt. "This isn't ordinary dirt, everyone. It's been consecrated by one of the oldest magical rites and one of the oldest Earth religions." She turned and bent her head toward the stone, releasing the handful of dirt as she did so. She murmured something, then stepped out of the depression.

"Be careful not to touch this particular area, else it'll take something from you."

"Did it take something from you?" Neville asked.

Regina opened her hand that had grasped the soil. It was streaked with red that was congealing into black. Some of the closer students realized there was blood on the soil she had let go of, but kept silent. The image of her open, bloodied hand, was fearsome enough. "Magic has specific rules, ones that must always be obeyed." She shook her hand over the depression, and the clots went flying. She was healing her palm with her wandless magic, and the soil seemed to absorb her blood greedily.

"This place isn't just fun and games. This was a place of serious magic, where various kinds of ley lines met. Wild magic tends to arise at places like these, if it's not tamped down and harnessed. Hence, the stones. They are erected with the specific purpose of channeling the energy found here. Of course, this means that for all of the magic coming in, there has to be a conduit out. That's where the Invisible Circle Stones come in. To most magicians, that circle actually is invisible. They can't see where the location is, let alone where the stones are. It's a magic vent, to feed the ley lines.

"Anything can happen in a place like this. Magic skills have their effects increased at least threefold, by most studies. Even simple spells here can have a great effect, which is why most of the time it's forbidden to do magic here. I've received some dispensation to show you how some of the stones work, how this kind of vortex works."

Regina placed her hands in front of her, palms facing each other. "This is what a magic sensing spell will look like." Soft tendrils of light began to accumulate between them, arcing softly back and forth in varying colors. When she moved her right hand downward suddenly, the lights arced into the ground, kicking up dirt with a little puff.

"Normally, you don't see the field. It certainly doesn't move anything. Yet you could see the field between my hands, you could see the dirt that came up. The spell was magnified so that it took on a physical aspect. That's not something you normally get with magic."

Regina allowed some questions regarding the nature of the stones' harnessing purposes, and explained the conventional knowledge available in Muggle texts. Some of the children laughed at the vast differences. Muggles believed Stonehenge was a giant calendar, created to predict the solstices for ceremonies. It certainly was the case, but that wasn't its single purpose, and by far was its least important function.

The temperature was dropping precipitously. Most of the students began to shiver, even within their winter robes. Regina stopped in mid-sentence, and said a strange word in a guttural voice. The air shimmered around them, and the temperature stopped dropping. She looked McGonagall and Flitwick in the eye. "Get them out of here."

Flitwick looked as though he would faint. "Oh dear... It can't be!"

McGonagall's mouth tightened. "Are you sure?"

Regina only nodded, and used her head to silently point behind them. The teachers and students all turned, and everyone could see the dark robed figures with white masks behind the mists that had closed in. Regina's warding spell was keeping it back for now.

"They'll break it soon," she said quietly. "Especially if we portkey out of here and no one is around to hold it up."

"What do you mean?"

"It's holding by my concentration. If it's broken for a portkey back to Hogwarts, they could possibly follow us back."

One of the first years began to wail in fear. The robed figures in the mist were closing in.

Regina knelt down in front of the first year. "Agatha, I won't let them in, okay? It's going to be fine. All of you are going to get out of here just fine."

"But you won't," Draco said suddenly, coming up next to her, his face paler than usual. "If you stay here to save us, you won't make it. They'll come for you as soon as you portkey."

"I know," she said quietly. "There's only a dozen of them, though."

There was a desperate look on his face. "You can't!"

Regina gently but firmly pushed Draco backwards, towards the assembled children. "You are going back to Hogwarts, where it's safe. Remember what I said before? Magic is enhanced here at least threefold."

"But so's theirs!" he cried.

"They're useless without their wands," Harry said, coming close to the front. He looked Regina in the eye. "Should I take the third portkey?"

"NO!" Draco yelled, turning on the other boy. "No, she has to come with us. There has to be some way."

"That was the fastest ward I could put up with any kind of strength. But it also means I have to be here. Physically, not just mentally." Regina sighed. "If there was time, maybe I could do something more lasting. But there's no time..."

"We've all the time in the world, just come with us!" Draco pleaded.

"She can't. She'll have to Apparate out after us."

"But you can't Apparate onto Hogwarts grounds!" Draco shouted.

Nobody answered Draco. Harry held his hand out to Regina, and she pulled the portkey out her pocket. He looked as nervous as Draco did, but was silent. Ron and Hermione were standing behind him now, shock etched onto their faces. "We'll take care of the kids, Regina. You don't have to worry about us."

"I know," she said with a small smile. "Go on with Minerva and Filius. And tell Dumbledore and whoever else you see. Someone has to get here as soon as possible."

Draco looked at her with an anguished expression. "You can't," he whispered.

Regina looked at him, her face fallen for just a moment. "I am responsible for all of you, for your safety as well as your instruction. And it's just a dozen. I can take it. I'll make enough time for you to portkey out, and I'll follow."

"Portkeys are instantaneous," Draco wailed. He reached out and grabbed her forearm desperately. "They couldn't follow, they're too far back."

"The wards around Hogwarts would be down for too long."

He looked at her blankly. "You can't go," he said brokenly. "You can't."

"Draco. Listen to me." He looked up at her miserably. "I accept all consequences of my actions. All of them. This is what it means to be a grownup. This is what it means to make decisions of your own. Sometimes you have to. It's not about wanting, it's about have to. And I have to keep you all safe."

Draco's face finally set itself into stone. "I'll keep the kids in line."

Regina flashed him a smile. "You do that. You help Harry, Ron and Hermione with my group of kids, okay? They'll be a rowdy bunch, wanting to see the action."

"What action?" Ron asked.

Regina suddenly grinned fiercely. "The action they get out of me."

She strode forward, to the very edge of her ward. "When I take their wands, I want you out of here, understood?" she yelled.

"Understood!" McGonagall and Flitwick yelled. They had the portkeys in hand, and their groups of students were clustered tightly together, hands linked. The third group clustered around the four sixth years, grabbing onto each other's robes to stay linked. "Understood!" Harry yelled after a moment.

"Accio wands!" Regina shouted, as at least twenty wands hurtled towards her.

Draco realized suddenly that she had lied. Harry shouted "Hogwarts!" at the same time as the wands began moving, and Draco could barely make out Regina shouting "Bring it on!" as she was barreling into the nearest Death Eater, making a wicked karate chop to his neck. He fell, and she moved into someone else, a kick into the jaw.

And then the Great Hall solidified in front of his eyes.

Draco ran as soon as it did, heading for Dumbledore's office, banging on the door with two fists, not realizing he was screaming the Headmaster's name. It felt like forever, but finally Dumbledore opened the door, and held Draco as he sobbed. "She lied, she lied, there's over twenty of them, there's too many, she can't take them alone. She can't, she can't, I told her she can't I told her..."

"She made her decision," Dumbledore said quietly. "She knew your safety was more important than hers."

"No it's not!" Draco cried. "I'm not worth a tenth of her!"

Dumbledore pushed Draco back slightly and showed him what he had been carrying in his hand. "I received this just as you arrived at my door."

It was a piece of Regina's jacket, as if it had been clawed from her back.

"It came with a note."

Draco numbly stared at the vellum in Dumbledore's hand, the words written there. He knew that handwriting. It had graced too many birthday cards for him not to know.

We must all make sacrifices.

***

Word spread throughout the school, and there was a hush over dinner. The teachers' table didn't even retain her empty chair; house elves hadn't set out a place, since she wasn't going to be eating there that night.

No one felt like talking, and Draco had almost skipped dinner entirely. But he was dragged there by Crabbe and Goyle, who hadn't been at Stonehenge, but had seen her move in the Slytherin gym. "I know it's bad... but she went down fighting, you said," Goyle whispered, trying to be helpful. "She'd bested us plenty of times."

"And she knows magic. Maybe she's just hiding," Crabbe added.

They knew he had liked her. They thought it was more than just a favorite teacher kind of like, since she had been young and friendly. They also knew that sometimes he had gone to talk to her after hours, in her rooms, and had guessed that there was more than talking involved. But they had never asked for specifics. It wasn't likely that they would get any specifics, in the first place, and in the second, Draco's temper had always been volatile when it came to this particular teacher. They hadn't understood what was so great about her class, about her or about the way she taught. They hadn't seen anything in her past her face and form, both of which they thought were pleasing, but not spectacularly so. But Draco had been upset at that, and had forbidden them to speak of Regina as anything other than a teacher.

Of course, they could speculate all they liked, and wrote home about Draco's infatuation with his teacher. They had thought it was amusing.

Draco had tuned them out, and stared down at the pudding and mashed potatoes in front of him. He had no appetite.

Across the hall, Draco noticed, most of the Gryffindors were also picking at their food. The Triumvirate in particular looked like they had settled into one huge puppy pile and had themselves a good cry. Draco had been stoic, a pure brooding Malfoy, a paragon of disdain and dark virtue. He was fucking sick of it.

Draco, on impulse, stood up from the table and walked over to the Gryffindor table. They eyed him warily, and his house mates were on edge. They were silently hoping he would take a swing at the great Harry Potter, knock him out and be done with it.

Draco stood there for what felt like a long time. He almost didn't know why he was there, everyone's eyes on him, wondering what he would do.

"You left her there, in the Standing Stones."

"I had to," Harry said quietly. His voice sounded raw, as if he had spent time screaming and had only just stopped. His food was untouched. "She wanted me to."

"You could've done something," Draco said, aware his voice was scathing, was carrying across the silent hall. "You're the Boy Who Lived."

"And I also don't know how!" Harry said, voice rising. "I don't know what she does, I don't have the skills. What should I have done? Offered to go in her place to be cut apart by twenty-seven Death Eaters?!"

Twenty-seven. Dear Merlin, he hadn't realized...

Hermione put a hand on Harry's arm, quieting him. She had realized that Draco had gone much too pale. "We couldn't stop her even if we had tried. She wanted to go, to make sure we got back safely."

"She didn't, now did she?" Draco was surprised at himself, not calling her a Mudblood in the silence. That would've made her feel awful, maybe cry.

"What do you want, Malfoy?" Ron cut in suddenly, his voice harsh and hurtful. "Just to make trouble? Act like you're the only one that misses her? We saw her attack them. We saw her save our lives. Don't act like it meant nothing."

"Then don't act like it's okay to forget her!" Draco snapped.

Hermione was shaking her head. "We haven't. We just don't know what to do."

Draco sneered at her. "No book plan? No courageous run first and think later plan? No running out to break a thousand school rules?"

Draco felt someone come up behind him. He leaned back from the advancing posture he had taken. Goddammit. He had been Making A Scene. His mother would have a fit. Oh no, his mother, Narcissa would have his head...

Let her. Let her, he didn't fucking care anymore.

Snape dropped a hand onto Draco's shoulder. "Let's go, this isn't helping anything."

Draco let himself be led out of the Great Hall, towards the Slytherin dungeons. To his surprise, they were heading to Snape's office. He waited until they had stopped. "Why did she have to do that?" he asked suddenly.

"You left your heart on your sleeve, Draco," Snape said instead, opening the door to his office. "It's not wise, not around here, with your classmates looking."

"Fuck it."

"No, you can't do that. Your father-"

"Can fuck himself for all I care," Draco spat venomously. "And if you tell him I said that, I don't give a damn."

"Sit down, Draco," Snape said tiredly. He took out two glasses and poured them both a measure of whiskey. "I assume you never took your Mark."

"I didn't want to kill those kids like that."

Snape took a sip of his whiskey and watched Draco imitate him. "Why not? All you've ever said to me before this is that you want your father proud of you. It would have made you become everything he wanted."

"Exactly. Everything he wanted, nothing of me in it. There was never anything in what I wanted to do with my life. Never any asking me what I felt."

"Is that so important?" Snape asked lazily. Draco nodded unhappily. "When did that happen? When did you stop needing your father's approval?"

Draco gulped down the rest of the whiskey and grimaced. It burned unsteadily down his throat, until he could feel the beginnings of his stomach. "When I realized I couldn't actually ever get it, I suppose."

"And what of Regina?"

"Maybe I love her, I don't know. I don't know what that's like. I don't know how," Draco said softly, staring at the empty glass. Snape poured him another drink. "Are you going to get me drunk?"

"I think you've earned this one," Snape said quietly, no malice in his tone. "For what you've told me here in honesty, you deserve some in return. I've been helping Dumbledore and his side because of excesses, because of a good many things I can't explain."

"Why are you telling me this? Aren't you afraid I'll do something with it?"

"No. Because you love her as much as I do, and sometimes the things you do for love hurt you more deeply than you think."

Draco blinked. "But..."

"You left her there because she asked you to. Because you trusted her enough that when she told you she could take care of it, you believed her."

"But she lied, there were too many of them..."

"She's not dead."

Snape's words had been abrupt. "What?" Draco asked, disbelieving.

"She's not dead. She may wish she was, but she's not dead. She's too valuable to them alive. They want to study her."

Draco gulped, remembering how he had written a raving letter about Regina's skills at the beginning of term. "It's my fault, then, I told Father about it." Draco finished the second glass. "What did you do for love?"

"I let her go."

Draco looked up at Snape, wondering. Snape finished off his third glass and poured them both another glass. "Why?"

"I thought she was better off without me. I was a Death Eater. She was young and not involved. It was best to keep her out of this."

"When was this?"

"Too long ago." Snape finished his glass and stared at it, contemplating a fifth. "Just before the Potters were killed."

"Were you...?"

"I let her go, and I lied to make sure she stayed away." He poured himself a fifth glass of whiskey. "The things we do for love..."

"Can we find her? If we went to the Standing Stones with a locator charm..."

"No. They would've made sure of that. They would have brought her somewhere Unmapped, the better to study her."

"Can she get back?"

"I hope she can," Snape said gloomily. The bottle was beginning to swim out of focus. The problems with drinking on an empty stomach...

"We can't sit here and do nothing."

"We're not. We're sitting here and getting drunk."

"Professor..."

"Draco. We can't find her. Unless she gets herself out of this, there's no way we can get to her. She knew this when she let you go ahead and became the diversion. Dumbledore knows he can't get her back, else he would've tried already. She's gone."

And then Draco put his head down on the desk, feeling his chest heave. But his father had drained him of all tears when he was young, until broken bones didn't hurt anymore, until there was nothing left of disappointment and bitterness than a vague ache. This was fiercer, sharper, something more painful in the absence of understanding.

She had been taken at the Standing Stones, site for thousands of sacrifices.

We must all make sacrifices.