A Merciless Affection

Chapter 43: Half Your Cast Disappears

Sarah climbed the stairs to the hospital wing more exhausted than the hour would suggest. More exhausted, for that matter, than the number of actual hours that had passed would suggest. She was bone tired. Her invisibly burgeoning stomach felt heavy, and her back ached. Any temptation to gloat over her performance to her dorm mates was squashed by the prospect of walking up all those flights to the Gryffindor common room.

A special commendation? Her heart rose. Is it too much to hope for? They were so rarely given. But if she got one.... It would give her more choices, for one. Surely even the Dark Lord would accept that she was too good at potions to be wasted on Bella's pet project. She might be offered an apprenticeship by someone notable, without even having to apply. Although--her hopes fell--the Dark Lord would not approve of her apprenticing with anyone but Severus.

Well, even if she were forced to leave Britain, surely any foreign authorities would have to recognize that she had attained the highest possible level in her subject. Wouldn't they? In Europe perhaps, but that was hardly far enough away to be safe if the Dark Lord sent his Death Eaters to punish an erstwhile follower for fleeing his service.

America then? (Setting aside that she had no way of getting there.) She had heard that Americans were dreadfully disdainful of anything foreign. They might well consider her N.E.W.T.s worthless. Maybe Canada? she thought, as she pushed through the doors to the hospital wing.

"Did you do well?" Madam Pomfrey asked. Her expression said that Sarah had better have made the expenditure of energy worthwhile.

"Yes," Sarah said, an involuntary smile such as Pomfrey had never witnessed forming on her lips. "But I just want to sleep."

"An excellent idea." Pomfrey settled her patient and pulled the screens around the bed, leaving Sarah curled up on her side, already drowsing off.

* * *

Sarah woke with a start in the darkened ward, aware of someone's presence. Not Pomfrey--she was so familiar with the woman's tread and manner of moving that, even if it woke her, she went right back to sleep. Sarah twisted round, feeling reflexively for her wand, as if her unconscious mind had already recognized a threat.

Standing at the gap in the screens was Severus Snape.

With her heart torn in a dozen different directions at once, she sat up uneasily.

"I...thought you weren't coming back," she said.

Severus slipped inside, then stopped without moving any closer.

"It seemed better not to disturb you," he said quietly, as if he were still afraid of waking her. "No good could come of further quarrelling between us."

This answer was so eminently reasonable that Sarah felt a little foolish for believing he had stayed away because he hated her. But, an inner voice spoke up, don't you hate him?

"Why are you here now?" she asked, unable to quell the hint of suspicion in her voice.

"I meant to stay away until after you'd completed all your examinations," he said. "That would have been the wisest--"

"But you had to know how I did in Potions," Sarah finished. Was it touching, that he cared? Was it offensive, that it was his efforts in preparing her that he wanted to gauge? Was it irritating, that that had driven him up here, when nothing else had?

"I could hardly lack interest in the outcome," he said stiffly.

She half-wanted to refuse to answer, to make him suffer, to make him as irritated at her as she was at him. But she wanted badly to tell someone to whom it really mattered.

"I made the Wolfsbane perfectly." She did not bother to suppress the note of triumph.

His tone, when he spoke, was impossible to read. "I suppose I should be grateful that you were not too ruffled to do so."

"I won't hold you to my apprenticeship papers," Sarah said, feeling the sting of his lack of enthusiasm. "I won't hold you to anything."

"I was under the impression," his voice tightened into his familiar sarcasm, "that it was you who had ejected me from your life, not the other way around."

Sarah was at a loss for words.

"Regardless of your feelings," he went on, "there are mutual concerns we must discuss. But not now."

"Maybe I...." she began. She missed him, with a desperation that had wound itself painfully around her heart. She felt, for an instant, that she would do or say anything to have things back the way they had been. "Maybe I was wrong."

It was a distressing admission, and the angry part of her mind clamored for renewed attention to the fact that he had used her horribly. But...had that only been in the beginning? She remembered the look in his eyes the last time he had come rushing into the hospital wing. Somewhere, in the time between those events, had he begun to love her? Or was it only that he had become very, very good at shamming? That was, after all, as natural to him as breathing.

"It was a mistake to discuss the subject when we did," he said. He did not say whose mistake it had been. Presumably hers, and yet his voice lost some of its edge when he said it. "I will not be drawn into discussing it now. You still have one N.E.W.T. to complete. Focus your attention on that. You and I both know that Astronomy is your weakest subject."

"Thank you for your confidence in me," Sarah said sarcastically.

"I was not aware that my confidence had any influence on you," he said. "Not any longer, at least."

"Maybe more than you suppose." Sarah's hands tightened on the blankets, and her voice betrayed her.

"Then I am more impressed that you succeeded with the Wolfsbane." And before she could process this comment or even think to answer, Severus had turned and slipped away.

Sarah's pride would not let her move until the sound of his footsteps faded. Then she turned back to her sleeping position. But she felt more like weeping than going back to sleep now. She let a few silent drops squeeze out before Madam Pomfrey came to check on her.

"Did he upset you?" the medi-witch asked, then added under her breath, "As if he wouldn't upset anyone."

Sarah swallowed her tears and hardened her soul, and her words came out steady and true. "He only wanted to know how I did in Potions."

"You remember that it's your effort that counts," Pomfrey said. "If you need a Calming Potion, I'll fetch one."

"No, thank you." Sarah let her head sink deeper into the pillow. "I'll be all right."

But she fell asleep wondering which of the possibilities their conversation had promised--a renewed argument or a reconciliation--was the one she really wanted.

* * *

Sarah was grateful to sleep in the following day. But by afternoon she was begging Madam Pomfrey for her Astronomy textbook. Just to revise a little--I haven't looked at the book in two weeks! And Pomfrey, seeing how upset she was, conceded wearily.

"But I'll confiscate it at ten o'clock promptly. So make good use of your time."

She did, concentrating on the things she was most likely to need and the most likely to have forgotten: star names, formulas. Everything else would have to depend on her memory.

The written exam, on Wednesday morning, was distressingly difficult. She wasn't sure she had applied the right formula to a certain set of questions, and in a few instances, she had completely forgotten the names of the stars she was asked to identify. She glanced with envy at the fifth years, bent over their papers. The O.W.L. had been so much easier in this subject.

The practical was not until after dark, of course. At eleven o'clock, the N.E.W.T. and O.W.L. students trudged up to the top of the Astronomy Tower, were given charts to fill out--of greater number and difficulty for the seventh years--and all fell to silent study of the stars. Again, Sarah found that her memory was failing her, although she thought she was getting enough of them right for a pass, at least.

The exam was nearing its end when Sarah heard Professor Tofty urging concentration in a voice that suggested that a number of people were clearly not concentrating. Sarah was too busy with her charts to take notice. Then, suddenly, the blast from a spell echoed across the grounds.

"No!" a girl near the front of the tower cried. None of the students on that side were looking through their telescopes. Instead they had crowded to the parapet and were staring down at whatever was going on below. The examiners' efforts to urge them back to their places were having no effect.

The sound of angry barking drifted up, and shouts from a deep voice that could only belong to Hagrid, the huge groundskeeper. Apparently, some kind of fight was going on down there. But since the examiners seemed unconcerned (except for the distraction to the students), she doubted it was an attack by Death Eaters. And nothing less was worth worrying about during an exam she was not sure of passing.

Ignoring the sounds as best she could, Sarah kept marking her charts. Then the voice of Professor McGonagall joined in the shouting coming from the grounds and disregarding the situation became impossible. By that time, however, Sarah was far back in the crowd that was trying to peer over the parapet, and she had no hope of seeing what was happening.

Between the shrieking of the students in the front, the gossiping of the students behind, and the exclamations--focused, at last, on the events below--of the examiners, there was no way of telling for certain what was going on. Sarah thought she heard Umbridge shout; naturally that woman would be involved wherever there was trouble.

But then, curiously, silence fell. Was it over, whatever it was? Yes, Professor Tofty was giving the five-minute warning for the end of the exam. Aggravated, Sarah hurried back to her telescope and scribbled in as many answers as she could before the time was up.

It was only in the chatter that broke out as the students put away their telescopes that Sarah finally heard what had happened: Umbridge, with a group of others, had attempted to take Hagrid captive--because of the niffler, several suggested--and Professor McGonagall had been attacked while attempting to help him. Hagrid, apparently, had escaped unharmed.

"Four stunners!" The words were passed from mouth to mouth.

"Did anyone go help her?" Sarah wanted to know. But no one seemed to have the answer.

* * *

The hospital wing was buzzing like an upset hive when Sarah arrived. A couple of sixth year I.S. members--big Slytherin goons--had been injured, as well as three adults she did not know. Umbridge was raging at those who were still conscious, and when she saw Sarah come in, she shouted, "What are you doing out of bed, Miss Darkglass?!" Then, without waiting for an answer, ordered, "Don't just stand there--do something to help!"

Sarah spied Madam Pomfrey down the row of beds, not far from Sarah's own, bending over a figure Sarah recognized. She rushed to Professor McGonagall's side. The old woman looked very pale--even a bit blue around the lips. Sarah had to look carefully to be sure she was still breathing. There was a curiously familiar scent in the air, but Sarah couldn't place it.

"Can I help?" she asked. Pomfrey's assistants were engaged in treating Umbridge's crew, leaving only the young apprentice to aid her.

"I really think I had better contact St. Mungo's," Pomfrey said. "She's too old to endure an attack like this." She shot a dirty look in Umbridge's direction.

Umbridge saw it, and stalked over. "Miss Darkglass has clearly recovered. I require her help over here, since you seem unwilling to render it yourself, Madam Pomfrey."

"Headmistress Umbridge," Pomfrey said sharply, and it was clear that her manner of address was not meant to be respectful, "I have a patient here--a longtime teacher at this school--who is in danger of dying. Your students' injuries are not serious, and my well-trained assistants are tending to your Ministry friends. Miss Darkglass is still a patient here. However, for the present distress, she may offer whatever help she chooses." Pomfrey turned her attention back to Professor McGonagall.

"Sarah," Umbridge said imperiously. "As a member of my Inquisitorial Squad, it is your responsibility to assist me in any way possible."

What does the woman think I can do? Sarah wondered. I'm a potion-maker, not a healer. No, she did not even care to know what Umbridge wanted. She stood up to her full height and took a deep breath. It seemed odd that she had not done this a long time ago.

"I resign."

"You what?" Umbridge asked, almost lightly, as though she did not believe what she was hearing and was therefore unconcerned about it.

"I said, I resign from the Inquisitorial Squad."

The shift in Umbridge's manner was so abrupt, Sarah would not have been surprised to see smoke come pouring from the woman's ears. "You can't do that!"

"You can't stop me, with all due respect," Sarah pointed out. Not that the headmistress was due much respect. "I have just completed my final N.E.W.T. and there is nothing whatsoever to keep me at Hogwarts. I would prefer to spend the rest of my time here with those who merit my loyalty. Who aren't just using me for their own selfish purposes. People like my Head of House."

Umbridge sputtered. "You...you...I'll never give you approval for that Hogwarts apprenticeship you wanted so badly!"

"That is of no concern to me," Sarah said. It was a lie, but it was one she had been trying convince herself of for two weeks, and she was practiced at it.

"I'll see to it that you will never obtain employment with the Ministry!" Umbridge raged on, her face turning a shade of red that clashed horribly with her pink cardigan.

Sarah could not help laughing--a mocking little laugh that she thought might give the headmistress apoplexy. She hoped it did. "What makes you think that I'll ever have any interest in employment with the Ministry? Now, if you'll excuse me. I'm afraid I don't have my badge on my person, but I'll return it at the earliest opportunity." With that, Sarah turned back to Madam Pomfrey, leaving Umbridge making noises like a kettle boiling over.

"Is there anything I can do for Professor McGonagall?" Sarah asked.

The work over the old woman's body did not seem particularly complex, but without medical training, she couldn't be sure. Pomfrey kept casting Ennervate at frequent intervals. The boy apprentice was applying drops of the potion Sarah had been smelling a minute ago--she recognized it, with a sudden, incongruous pang of memory, as Ignatias Tonic--to McGonagall's lips between Pomfrey's spells.

"Tristan," Pomfrey said. "If Miss Darkglass takes over the potion, can you perform the spell?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Good. I need to call St. Mungo's on the mirror. They have techniques and potions on hand that are beyond what I can do here." Madam Pomfrey sounded haggard.

Sarah went around the bed and took the bottle and dropper from Tristan, trying not to remember the day she had learned to make this potion. The touch of her professor's hand on hers. The startled look in his eyes as he realized what he was doing. The shattered vial. The detention. She drew herself back from the memory with a sharp, deep breath.

"One drop between spells. Try to get it under her tongue, if you can aim that well," the apprentice said dubiously. He took Pomfrey's place on the other side of the bed. Sarah noticed that Umbridge had gone back to cajoling the assistants who were working over her Ministry associates, but when she saw Pomfrey go past her, she followed the medi-witch back into her office. Oh, well. Madam Pomfrey would have to deal with that problem on her own.

"Ennervate!" Tristan said, swishing his wand. "Okay, now!"

Sarah discovered that it was a little more tricky to get the medicine into McGonagall's mouth than she had supposed it would be. She had to use a second drop after the first one rolled along to the corner of her lips and leaked out.

"Why is it not doing her any good?" Sarah asked, after three more rounds of spells and potion. McGonagall looked no better than when Sarah had first come in.

"It's bloody well keeping her alive, that's all," Tristan said.

Sarah was glad when Pomfrey returned and she could leave matters in more capable hands.

"St. Mungo's is setting up a special Portkey. The Ministry don't like to breach the wards of Hogwarts, especially after what happened with the Triwizard Cup. We may have to transport her down to the gates if approval can't be got, and we may not be able to do either before dawn."

* * *

Pomfrey's assistants finally managed to revive the Ministry Aurors Umbridge had sent for to help her arrest Hagrid. His escape had enraged the headmistress, and she ranted on for some time, throwing nasty looks in the direction of McGonagall's bed, until at last she gave up and stormed off to bed, leaving instructions for the handful of I.S. members who had come to look in on their friends to wake her if anything important occurred.

One of the Aurors had sustained a large number of broken bones, and frequently moaned as he was being treated. The other two had been concussed, although one also had a broken leg. Madam Pomfrey had Sarah take another turn tending Professor McGonagall while she checked on her assistants' work with the men--but not, Sarah noted, until after Umbridge had left. Eventually, because she knew the medi-witch would have ordered her to do so if she'd had the time to think of it, Sarah retired to her bed, and to a fitful sleep.

Sarah woke in the pale dawn to see Pomfrey, Severus and Professor Flitwick moving McGonagall onto a stretcher. Only one Auror remained in the hospital wing, along with the two I.S. thugs. All three were sleeping.

Sarah got up. McGonagall still did not look at all well, although it was rapidly apparent that the Ennervation treatments were not being administered quite as often as before, and Pomfrey was dispensing the potion herself.

"What can I do?"

The comment seemed to startle the adults. It was fortunate that McGonagall had been settled on the floating stretcher before their heads all jerked around.

"Nothing, you're a patient again," Pomfrey said, recovering her composure, although the wakeful, worried night she had spent was written all over her.

"Go back to sleep, Miss Darkglass," Severus ordered. "You are still ill and this matter does not concern you."

It occurred to Sarah, with abrupt surprise, that Professor Flitwick might not be on the need-to-know list.

"She is my Head of House!"

"Do not contradict me, Miss Darkglass." His dark eyes fixed on her, and she saw the corner of his mouth twitch slightly. She wasn't sure whether to laugh or cry.

It was on her lips to say "You can hardly give me a detention now" when she realized that Severus had no time to play verbal games with her.

"Please take good care of her," she said instead, meekly.

"Of course we will," Professor Flitwick chimed in, with the unflappable cheerfulness she remembered from five years of Charms. "Don't worry." She might have believed him if she had not seen the unusual tightness of his face.

Not knowing what else to do, Sarah lay back down, letting them get on with their task. But she could not help thinking, as they moved the stretcher down the room, that it looked disturbingly like a funeral procession.

She buried her face against the pillow. "Please, no."

* * *

Sarah slept again, all through the morning light that streamed in the windows, and into the early afternoon. She woke when Tristan brought her a lunch tray.

"What a night, eh?" he said. "I just woke up myself. Madam Pomfrey's still asleep. 'Spect she'll be up soon."

"Do you think..." it was frightening even to say it. "Will Professor McGonagall be all right?"

Tristan bit his lip, and ran a hand back through his unruly blond hair. "They should be able to do something for her at St. Mungo's. It's just...I've hardly ever seen Madam Pomfrey transfer a patient...."

Sarah looked around. The Slytherins had gone. A screen stood around the bed where the injured Auror had lain. Montague seemed to be working a crossword puzzle, although at the moment he was staring blankly into space. Tristan went back to his other duties, and Sarah began picking at her food.

It was strange to think that she wouldn't be here much longer. Not just in the hospital wing, but at Hogwarts. Having spent three-fourths of every year for the past seven years here made it as much home as anyplace could be. Especially since the place she had called home during those years was no longer open to her. Examinations would be over tomorrow, and a week after that, the students would go home.

Where will I go?

It was not, of course, the first time she had thought about it. As she'd had no answers, she had pushed the matter aside. But it was becoming increasingly difficult to do so. And her life had become so tangled up with Severus Snape's that any realistic decision about her future would require his input. Like it or not.

She thought of Miriam's threat to take Sarah home with her. And Miriam was all right. But could she endure living in Caius Snape's household? She was not sure she could.

She hadn't had a chance to check with Gringotts to see whether Franklin Nott had given her the money she had asked for. But she was not sure, even if she took a flat of her own--either in Diagon or Knockturn Alley--that she would dare to live there alone. She would be too vulnerable to any Death Eater who chose to make her life difficult. Perhaps she was better off with the Death Eater she knew. Even if his reasons for protecting her were less noble than she'd thought. But could she live in Severus' tiny flat, still at odds with him?

How did I ever get into such a mess?

* * *

By the time Pomfrey appeared on the ward, still tired and worried, Sarah had worked herself up to asking the medi-witch for permission to walk freely about the school. Her exams were over. Hadn't she rested enough? Provided that she still spent most of her time here, how could it hurt her to have a little more freedom?

Pomfrey conceded. It was obvious that last night had taken a great deal out of her.

Sarah, now at liberty, went up to her dormitory. She had been wearing the same robes--duly and carefully laundered and returned to her each day--for two weeks, and she was tired of them, as well as of the plain, white, infirmary-issue nightgown. And then there was the little matter of her I.S. badge, which she had left pinned inside the sleeve of the robes she had been wearing when she was kidnapped and had not bothered to remove from them when she had changed.

Florence and Patricia were in the common room when Sarah went past, but no one was in their dorm room. Sarah found the silver 'I' pin still fastened to her now-clean robes, and she pocketed it, grateful that she need no longer worry about the Inquisitorial Squad or any of their works. Then she chose some casual clothes, underthings and another set of robes (not the ones she had worn to the Notts'). She stowed the rest of her possessions in her trunk and locked it. She would be leaving soon and not coming back.

She made a brief stop in the library on her way back. Only a few determined souls were still studying. The small fiction section--which Madam Pince kept under protest--had been largely depleted by those who, like Sarah, enjoyed reading, now that their textbooks were no longer the order of the day. But Sarah snagged an interesting title she couldn't remember reading before--Under the Moonlight by Hannah Hannigan--as well as an old favorite, Careers in Potions. She thought there had been some information on foreign careers, although she had never read that part with much interest before.

She organized her few belongings on her bedside table in the hospital wing. She wasn't ready yet to go looking for Umbridge, no matter how eager she was rid herself of the silver badge. She was torn between going out by the lake or staying inside, between trying to make some decisions about her future and letting herself be whisked away by someone else's griefs and delights. Ultimately, she decided on the latter, in both cases. She curled up with Under the Moonlight and proceeded to while away her afternoon.

She didn't think too much about it at first when, as she returned from the bathroom later in the day, she saw Harry Potter striding out of the ward. Not that there was anyone here the boy would want to see, she thought, puzzled, taking in both the screened Auror and Montague, whom Madam Pomfrey had just finished dosing with one of the many potions he took each day.

"He was looking for Professor McGonagall," Pomfrey commented, noticing Sarah's expression. "I hope everyone in the school finds out about this incident. Perhaps if more parents were aware of our new headmistress's behavior, they might bring pressure to bear on the Ministry. I don't know how we can go on like this...."

Potter, looking for McGonagall...that wasn't terribly unusual. She was his Head of House, too, after all, and he was a fifth year, so he'd probably seen what had happened to her, from up on the tower last night. Still, he'd taken his own sweet time about coming to see her. Sarah sighed and settled back onto her bed. She'd had no great affection for the boy, not after the incident with the Pensieve, back before Easter, although that had been for Severus' sake. Now she didn't know whether to sustain her annoyance at Potter or to believe in his role as potential defeater of the Dark Lord.

Well, if the matter had been important, he would have said so to Madam Pomfrey.

A short time later, Tristan brought Sarah's dinner tray. Surprisingly, she was actually hungry, for the first time in weeks. Thank goodness exams were over! She finished her meal with gusto, and had just picked up her book again when she felt a curious tingling against her side.

Oh! The I.S. badge. Undoubtedly yet another student-inflicted emergency for Umbridge to deal with. Smiling--both at woman's difficulties and the happy memory of her own resignation--Sarah lowered her eyes to her book and went on reading.