Interlude

Interlude, pt 2

Alex woke feeling good. OWL results were due today and Alex was certain to be in the top three at Durmstrang's. Alex thought over the last five years since leaving the Captain. Alex's plans were moving ahead right on schedule. With the exception of an occasional blackout, which nobody but Alex knew about, Alex thought she might have the perfect life.

Alex bounced out of bed and began the exercises that were second nature after eleven years. While Alex had finally gotten past most of the things the Captain had done to her, he had left her with two obsessions. Alex had to be perfect in anything she did. Schoolwork, Quidditch, or whatever, she had to be the very best. She was also fanatical about physical fitness, an obsession that earned her some strange looks from the other students.

Alexandra finished her exercises and looked into the full-length mirror in her room. Alex had the only single person room in Durmstrang's, not as a privilege, but because she still had nightmares about the Captain and her mother's death. Those nightmares combined with the Empathy that all Healers had, made sleeping in the same room with her a horror. Looking in the mirror, she saw a tall slim girl of 16, with pale blue eyes. Her body was firmly muscular, with graceful curves that had started just a few months ago.

As she noted the curves, a voice in her head started speaking. Alex fell into a reverie and green eyes blazed in the mirror as she heard the Captain's voice.

"Women are weak, merely vessels for men's pleasure." The Captain was sitting in his chair, clutching a bottle. He drank from it before continuing. "Women need nothing except a house to clean, children to raise and a man to serve." He drank again. "Women who do anything else are unnatural freaks, and no better than they need to be. They are physically weak and mentally inferior."

Alex shook off the old memory. She reassured herself that she was not like that. Not only was she in better shape than anyone in Durmstrang's, she was about to prove she was smarter than most when the OWLs were posted.

She began the process of uncoiling and unbraiding her one vanity. A little careful magic over the last five years had given Alex a shimmering mass of hair that fell below her knees. She had maintained that she would never again allow it to be cut after the short crew cuts of her first eleven years. When she had it down, she took a quick shower. Coming out of the shower, she dried off, using a spell to dry her hair. Alex took a quick look around her room, and grabbed the things she would need for classes today. She ran down the stairs and found her best friend in the dining hall already.

Sitting down she dished up her breakfast and ate the same way she did everything: neatly, quickly and efficiently. After she was done, she looked up at Ami Durmstrang, the youngest daughter of the Durmstrang family that had founded the school. Ami had been her friend since first year, and was fully aware that talking to Alex while she ate was an exercise in futility.

"Good morning Alex," she said, "What's with the hair? Are you so eager to see the OWL results?"

Alex raised an eyebrow, and shrugged. "No, I just felt like leaving it down today."

The two girls were chatting when Mat Robere came up and sat next to Ami. "Hello Ladies," he said. "Alex, can I bribe you?"

Alex tilted her head. "That depends. What are you offering?"

Mat smiled. " Your choice, new Keeper's gloves or a box of books from the store in Drakenoir."

Alex blinked. "Big bribes. What do you want?"

Mat lowered his voice. " Your best estimate on how many OWLs you, Nancy and Zeb are going to get."

Alex and Ami looked at each other and then at Mat.

Ami grinned. " Betting on it are you?"

Mat nodded. " Sure I am, and that's why I'm coming to Alex. She can judge these things within a fine hair."

Ami looked speculative. "What are the odds on who's going to be best?"

Mat shook his head. "There aren't any, no one will bet against the perfect one here."

Alex blushed. "Come on, I'm not that good." Mat and Ami just stared at her.

Ami was the first to speak. "Please Alex, in five years, no one has ever seen you turn in a paper that is less than perfect, and the teachers all use one of your papers as an example of what a good paper should be."

Mat chimed in. "Five years ago you hadn't even been on a broomstick, and this year you set a new school record, as the only keeper to go a full season without being scored on, and you're the team captain."

Alex was bright red by the time her friends finished extolling her virtues. She responded quietly. "My assignments are perfect because I did them over and over before turning them in. As for the Quidditch, had my strategies been a little better, we would not have lost three games. I would have found a way for the team to score enough points that the snitch wouldn't have mattered."

Mat and Ami just shook their heads and changed the subject. Mat got her best estimates on the OWLs and left to make his bet, after arranging to pay the bribe the next day. The two girls continued chatting for a few more minutes, and then headed off for their first class of the day.

At lunch, Mat and the girls were sitting in the hall when a student came in, and said the OWLs were posted. Mat grinned. "Let's go see how badly our hero here beat her competition." Alex just shook her head at him, as she led the way into the Common Hall. By long custom, the top five students OWLs were posted for everyone to see, and the rest of them were visible only to the student whose score it was. In the Hall, the three friends made their way through the crowd to see the scores. When they got there, only Alex was shocked at the scores.

"I told you so," Mat crowed. "You got 15 outstanding OWLs."

Alex looked at Mat, who's elation was easy to see. "You didn't bet my prediction, did you Mat?"

Mat shrugged. "Yes and no. I bet your guess for Nancy and Zeb, but you always underestimate yourself, so I bet you to get 15 Owls, and you did." Mat grinned widely. "I bet for an exact match, and got it, so you get both of the bribes tomorrow, and lunch is on me too."

After the day's classes were done, Alex went for her daily run. On her way back from the run, she ran into Jerome Peneker, a 4th year student she barely knew. Jerome looked at her and suddenly turned red. He mumbled something Alex didn't catch and started away. Alex reached with her Empathy, and looked to see what had him so worked up. When she did, she got a shock. She saw herself as Jerome saw her: a tall and slim woman, whose curves were very evident in the Muggle spandex she wore to run in. Alex blinked and stopped the vision, considering his feelings about her. He didn't know her any better than she knew him, and his main desire was to find a private corner with her.

Green eyes shone as Alex heard the Captain taunting her again. "Real men only want one thing from a woman; they know what a woman is for."

Alex snarled at the voice in her head. "Shut up you, you're not real."

She continued up the stairs to her room, thinking about what Jerome had been feeling. She showered and dried her hair, the encounter in the stairway still on her mind. She was braiding her hair, and looking in the mirror with newly opened eyes. Alex's sole concern with her body was that it did what she wanted it to. She had always been the tallest girl in school, and prior to developing, she had been one of the skinniest people in school and well. As she finished braiding her hair, she conjured another mirror, and looked at her entire body, front and back.

What she saw was a woman very unlikely to be mistaken for a man. She frowned as the Captain mumbled in the back of her head, but pushed down the voice. She went down to dinner still pondering the changes in her body.

She joined her friends at their table in the dining hall, and remembering the encounter with Jerome, Alex used her Empathy to read Mat's feelings for her. The main part of his emotions was love, affection and desire, but they were not directed at her. Alex smiled as she contemplated the direction of the feelings Mat was not even sure of yet. She probed a bit deeper, looking for how he felt about her. Admiration was at the top, and affection with the feel that she assigned to siblings. She smiled again as the voice in her head grumbled. The whole process took just a few seconds, and she slid into her seat next to Ami. While Durmstrang's did not have assigned seats, the students normally sat grouped by years, with a few exceptions.

After dinner, Ami asked Alex to join Mat and her walking around the gardens attached to the school. Alex shook her head. "I can't, I have to study."

The other two stared at her in disbelief. "Alex, we have one week of class left, and no more tests this year. What could you be studying now?" asked Mat.

Alex looked at them in mild surprise. "You might not have any more tests, but I have a test with the Healer, and the NEWTs are only two years away."

Ami rolled her eyes. "You just got a perfect score on the OWLs, can't you relax for a while?"

Alex shook her head. "Of course not. I set a standard, and now I have to maintain it. Besides, you know I only take one day off a week, and we're going into Drakenoir tomorrow."

Mat stared at her somberly. "Alex, what are you going to do after Durmstrang?"

Alex raised an eyebrow quizzically. "I'm going to be a Healer of course."

Mat shook his head. "That's a job, not a life. What else will you do?"

Alex smiled gently. "No, it's not a job, but an avocation, something I have to do." Alex was not being dramatic. The heat that had kept her physically fit when the Captain pushed her body to breaking point and beyond was the Healing talent. The only real problem with the talent was that once you started using it, you had to continue using it. The students had found that for minor injuries, Alex was faster and easier than the Mediwizard. (Plus, Alex never asked how you were injured, which was a bonus sometimes.)

If Alex didn't use the Healing talent on a regular basis, she would get headaches and physical pain until she did. Alex visualized the Healing talent as a well under pressure, with a cap on it. If the pressure got too high, the cap would blow. As Alex was that cap, she had no desire to see what happened if she didn't use it. Alex spent the rest of the night studying with the Mediwizard.

The next morning, Alex was finished with her exercises and had just gotten out of the shower when Ami knocked at her door and came in without waiting for an answer. Ami looked at the bed, where Alex had laid out the clothes for the day. Ami shook her head. "I thought so. You are so not wearing the school uniform today." Ami started digging through Alex's closet. "You have school uniforms in here, Quidditch uniforms, and that Muggle stuff you wear to run in. Where are your clothes?"

Alex shrugged. "I didn't bring any. I don't wear anything but that stuff, so it would have been inefficient to bring anything else."

Ami grabbed her by the hand and started for Ami's room down the hall. "Alex, you're a great friend, but this obsession with efficiency is just weird."

In Ami's room, Ami started trying to find something that Alex would wear. Alex turned most of Ami's clothes down, as they "Aren't my style." as Alex diplomatically put it. Ami was a member of the school's "Muggle appreciation club" and she was enamored by a current Muggle fad called "Goth" which Alex didn't understand and didn't want to understand.

Finally, Ami found an old sundress that Alex could wear after they used a bit of magic to make it long enough for her. Ami was dressed in a Muggle outfit, a leotard under jeans. Ami put on a touch of the black make up which Alex utterly refused. Ami had expected that, and just shook her head. "If I had your face and figure, I'd be flaunting it. Maybe then Mat would notice I am a girl."

Alex raised an eyebrow at her words. "Mat knows you're a girl." Remembering what she'd found when she probed Mat, Alex grinned. "In fact, he's very certain you're a girl."

Ami looked at her. "Yeah right. He treats me like one of the boys."

Alex gave a dramatic sigh, while rolling her eyes. "Ami, I am an Empath, trust me on this. Mat is very aware of you." Going downstairs, they met Mat on the stairs.

"I'm seeing things." was his first comment, as he pretended to faint. "Alex, in real clothes? Who stole your uniforms?" Mat was teasing Alex, but his eyes were on Ami.

Ami pretended to be hurt. "What? Don't you have anything to say about my outfit? I'm so hurt"

Mat smiled while a flush crept up his neck. "You look very nice also." Ami smiled back. "Thank you Mat, you look good also."

Mat was wearing the jeans he wore all the time, even under the school robes. His shirt was tight enough to give hints of the muscles that five years of Beater practice had given him, and Alex felt her friend's emotions spike as they looked at each other. Alex watched the unconscious byplay between the two with amusement.

The friends plotted their day on the town after they ate breakfast. Mat grinned wryly. "I know you and that bookstore Alex. That will be the last place we go, so you don't spend the entire day there."

Alex smiled slyly as a sudden thought hit her. "Why don't I go there first, and you two wander around for awhile. You can come back for me after an hour or two." Alex grinned at Ami, who had agreed with that plan instantly. Mat agreed, but said they would be back for her in exactly two hours.

Drakenoir and Durmstrang's were on the edge of the human lands, before you crossed over into the Giant lands. Commonly called the Borderlands, it was subject to regular incursions by the giants. Since the school was almost three miles from the village, walking to the village was not allowed. Instead, the school had a number of Portkeys that took students to the village.

The three friends signed out a Portkey and ported to the village. Drakenoir was a small village of about 400 people. As the last human settlement before the giant lands, living here was a constant battle with marauding giants. The village did serve two purposes. The border guards used it as a resupply point for their trips along the borders. Drakenoir's other purpose was mining the world's only known supply of the magically charged crystals that could be used in a variety of endeavors. The Magicrystals were very rare, with less than fifty being found every year. This made the Magicrystals fantastically expensive.

Other than the mine, and the businesses that supported it, there was a small second hand store run by an elderly wizard. The store sold mostly books, but it also carried a number of oddities both wizard and Muggle. Alex and her friends headed for the store as soon as they appeared at the school port point in the village.
Entering the store, Alex grinned at Alan Derring, the store's owner. "Hello Mr. Derring. Do you have anything new for me to look at?"

The wizened wizard smiled back at one of his best customers. "There are several boxes of books that I haven't gone through yet. They came from an estate sale in England. Mostly Muggle books I think, although there may be a few wizard texts in there." Alex pulled Mat to one side while Ami was examining a strange Muggle device. Alex suggested that Mat might want to get Ami something nice, and let him go. Mat and Ami left, and Alex grabbed a box to fill with books for her bribe.

Alex found the boxes in the back of the store, and read the side of them. "Riddle family estate, books; leather bound. 30 pieces."

Alex opened the first box, and started going through the boxes. She had finished the first box, finding a few new books that sounded interesting and was going through the second. As she reached for a book, she brushed another one bound in black that sent a shock through her system.

Green eyes lit with an inner fire as she lifted the book out, and opened it. She read a page, and set the book down. Running her hand over the rest of the books, she found six more that sent a shock through her body. She placed the books at the bottom of the carton and covered them with the books she had already chosen. The green eyes faded into blue and Alex continued without even realizing she had been replaced.

After she had filled her carton, she took it up to the counter. Alex and Mr. Derring thoroughly enjoyed dickering over the various things Alex bought, and this session was just as good as any other. When they were done, Mr. Derring grinned. "Three months it's been since you were here, I thought you had forgotten me."

Alex smiled at her friend. "I've been busy with the OWLs Mr. Derring."

Mr. Derring looked up. "Oh yes, the OWLs. How did you do?" Alex blushed, and muttered something about doing ok. Mr. Derring tilted his head and shot her a sharp glance. He knew Alex well, and pressed her for a specific number.

Alex looked at the ceiling as she admitted getting fifteen OWLs. The storekeeper smiled broadly. "A perfect score, I knew you could do it." Conversation shifted to other subjects, and when Alex's friends came back to get her, they were discussing the advantages of Apple computers over Microsoft. Ami and Mat listened to them for a few minutes, but were quickly lost. Mat paid for the books, and Mr. Derring gave the box to his house elf to deliver to the school.

Mat made good on his promise and bought Alex the new Quidditch gloves. He also bought Ami a delicate bracelet with a small heart on it. Alex moved back, giving them some privacy while Mat tried to put it on Ami. The two of them were blushing and trembling so much that Mat had a hard time getting it fastened. When he finally got it on, he looked at Ami, and slowly bent his head. Ami's eyes went wide, and then closed as Mat kissed her.

The rest of the morning was very long for Alex, as the new couple spent most of it wandering hand in hand, interspaced with kisses in every private corner they found. At lunch, Alex told the lovebirds that she was going back early.

"I have to find a spell to cure diabetes," she teased them. She got an impish look in her eyes as she rose. "Don't miss curfew."

Alex went back to the school office in Drakenoir and ported back to the school. She spent the rest of the day studying her Mediwizardry, as she had her last test on Monday. About nine, she grabbed a book out of the carton and read "Lunatic Café" until she fell asleep.

Epilogue, pt 1

Madness shone in the eyes that gleamed through the bars. "This one is stark raving mad. We don't ever let him out." The senior guard looked at the new guard. "He was a soldier once, and he's still dangerous. It took nine of us to put him back in that cell after the last time he was out, and half of us went to the hospital afterwards." The two guards continued down the row of cells.

In the small cell, the Captain had forgotten almost everything. The only things he had left were a burning hatred of a face he no longer had a name for, and an animal cunning. Day after day, he paced the cell until he dropped from sheer exhaustion. Time after time, he tried the bars and door of the cell, never remembering having done it before.

Epilogue, pt 2

Alex's eyes opened shortly after she had fallen asleep. In the dim light of her room, the green eyes glittered as she collected the seven books and placed them on the desk. An empty eighth book was added, and Alex began making notes. Three hours later, the books were shrunk and hidden away. The green-eyed girl went back to bed, drifting off to sleep very quickly.

In the morning, Alex rubbed at sore eyes, and looked into the mirror. Her pale blue eyes were bloodshot. Alex made a mental note to get more sleep as she started her day.