Time was close to slip through her fingers. Her outlines, barely mirroring in the tiny hourglass of the small, round, golden object in her trembling hand. Two months and she could already see herself heading for Professor McGonagall’s office, throwing that piece right at the old Lady’s face. You know that you are asking quite a lot from yourself? Are you sure you can deal with this? Awful things have happened to wizards who meddled with time. And how she knew now. Yet she hadn’t been seen by anyone or been anywhere in a faintly wrong moment – she sighed. It was exactly that. She was exhausted and tired of it all, even though all those subjects were still too interesting for giving up on them. She wanted it. She wanted to do this so badly. And all things McGonagall had loaded upon herself for making this possible – there was no choice. She had no choice. She just couldn’t be so selfish and break her own word. But the stress – all the stress – she was only fourteen years of age! How could she have been so naïve to entrust herself with such madness?
A shaking hand in front of her eyes, the golden thing whirling around like it was bound to a mad Snitch. Actually her whole body was trembling in the cold rain. With an annoyed grunt she slipped the Time-Turner back beneath her soaked clothes. If she had only brought an umbrella with her - or something as simple as a cloak – or at least cast the Impervius Spell – but no, she had just walked and walked and walked, not caring about the emerging rain or the wind slowly getting heavier. Only when the wind had stopped blowing, she had come to halt, just to get out that tiny piece of manifested trouble, ponder and hide it again. Shivering, she wrapped her arms around her body, maybe in hope to get warmer. But not even robbing her arms made her situation better. Worse, the more she did to warm herself, the colder she felt.
Half worried, half angry with herself that she might actually get sick from something as unimportant as the weather, she let her look travel around. She must have left the path a long time ago. There was nothing but trees around her, though she was certain that it was not the forbidden part of the woods around the school grounds. There was still too much rain falling through the empty branches. Here and there some brown leaves hung down limply from those claw-like forms, desperately clinging to the edge of life. Somehow she felt sympathy for the branches. They suffered from the cold autumn weather as much as she did, and momentarily she was glad that she didn’t need to share their fate every day. Examining her surrounding again, she noticed she could see her own breath in front of her. Not enough, the raindrops turned into snowflakes, sailing down peacefully. Almost leisure, she raised an eyebrow. Had winter really just arrived? After all, it was the day before Hallowe’en. Still she found it a bit early for snow.
She liked snow, somehow, if it fitted her mood, but at the moment it was the coronation to her tired sadness. Fortunately, as if a gigantic bell rang somewhere in her mind, also that mind realised that the cold had nothing to do with the weather. At least not fully. Slightly panicking, her head flew around once more. How far – how far had she actually walked away from the path?
Not many more seconds than it had taken her to build up that thought again, they needed to encircle her. Covered in torn black cloak like materials, slowly floating closer towards her, the five of them locked her immediately, into a prison-like shrinking cupola that had no space for welfare or joy and it felt as though it was not five Dementors, but all her teachers and even her parents capturing her with words of disgust pouring down on her. Trembling worse than before, she shrunk amidst them, her life being the least valuable thing on earth. She could hardly breathe, couldn’t think properly, had forgotten where she had put her wand that was no use anyhow and she was close to vomit something she couldn’t remember to have eaten. Her parents grinned maliciously, splitting, into a hundred monsters surrounding her, ready to push her down with a desire beyond her imagination of pleasure. Fully incapable of breathing due to that heavy knot in her throat that yet kept her insides from spilling out on their own and on the other hand unable to swallow it down, she feared to suffocate in a sea of mere anxiety.
And it had been her own fault. She had failed at sticking to a simple rule: staying on the secure paths. Staying on the safe grounds. The creature in front of her sped up, directly flying towards her head, and her arms suddenly ceased all the trembling to only launch themselves over the soundless scream of terror on her face so as to not let the hooded get into it. Everything went dark. A black mass, veil-like, fell from the sky, the Dementor drifting into a distance behind her ability to see. Relieved that she didn’t need to witness impersonated death seizing her soul, she accepted the end.
But it didn’t come. Confused, she stared over her arms, slowly getting to realise that it was not a Dementor that stood in front of her. The beast had backed away some feet, just as if it was shocked by the sudden interruption. She tried to figure out what it actually was that had made the Dementor falter: a large figure covered in a clean, black, hooded cloak materialised from the fog that had dropped down like ink into water before she had decided any act of hers to be useless. With a long black wand in the right hand and the back turned to her, the figure forced Hermione to step against one of the thick, high trees. Eventually she understood that this meant there was no Dementor behind her either. However, two of them now sped at her and the hooded. She could hear her own scream in distance, with the knot gone at last, before she was swallowed by blinding light – the following darkness, she only saw when she felt her lids shut.
Hours must have passed. Feeling totally squelched, she found herself sitting on the cold moss, leant against the very same tree. Slowly the view in front of her eyes cleared and she met quite familiar dark eyes staring into her own, worried but relieved at the same time. She had never seen these eyes so close. No – she had – once – but they had been really angry then. There was no anger now. No hate, no disgust, she figured, when her senses returned, and could hear rain hitting the fallen leaves. No rain fell on her and her still hooded saviour though. When she looked further up, she saw something like a mirror made of thin glass above their heads, covering them from the rain and reflecting her stare faintly. Startling, she then felt a hand on her left shoulder and one on the right side of her head, touching her hair only.
“Are you all right?”, his deep, quiet voice had never sounded that soft.
“I – ”, she gargled, “I’m okay, Professor.”
“Are you sure?”, she was finally back at her senses; at least enough to wonder when he had managed to develop something like honest care.
“Yes.”, she aspirated. “I’m fine, Sir.”
“Wait.”
He had taken his hands off her to pull a small sack from the left front pocket of his black trousers, which he enlarged with his wand, opened the strings and pushed his left arm weirdly deep into it. Hermione heard something like the drawer of a cupboard being opened and closed again. With a frown of curiosity she saw his hand reappear, holding a small package. He pulled the strings, shrunk the purple embroidered black pouch and let it disappear in his pocket again.
“That will make you feel better.”, he held a piece of badly wrapped dark chocolate towards her.
“Chocolate? Now that is a common medicine, is it? Not just a simple momentary cure discovered by Professor Lupin?”
“I see, your brain is back. Eat and your body might be as well. It is the theobromine in it; that which plays a fair part in making some people addicted to chocolate. Yes, one can become seriously addicted to that stuff. Take Professor Dumbledore, for example. I still wonder how he could stay healthy in his high age while having been addicted to sweets for almost his entire life. I do not want to know the tricks he did to his teeth, however. Eat. It is getting dark already and I am not really sure whether I can ask much of you. Flying would be rather counterproductive in your current state and you have walked quite a distance.”
“Flying? You think I’d fall off the broom?”, Hermione whispered, taking a bite. “That – that’s – ”, surprised, she looked down on the chocolate. “Spearmint filling!”
“Of course I flew all the way on a broom. Didn’t you see me making it disappear into thin air so it wouldn’t hinder me saving that foolish girl’s buttocks?”, he raised an eyebrow with familiar sarcasm. “And the openly displayed roads of a mind as yours, are easy to wander for nearly everyone with little skill. So yes, spearmint.”, somehow his words made her feel small again. “Now don’t pull such a face. Get up. With the Dementors around, the grounds are even less welcoming at nighttimes than they usually are for most people.”
Slightly assisted by him, she managed to stand up. It took a while until her legs did what she wanted. When she could lastly walk somewhat straight, something even more peculiar than the overall situation already was, made her stumble once again. He had removed the shield above their heads as it had stopped raining and thrown half of his wide cloak around her.
They hadn’t spoken a word after they had left the place where Hermione had been attacked. Going all the way back she began to grasp how far she had in fact gotten off the path and away from the safe area of the school grounds and when they finally reached said path, it was already naturally dark. Not stark dark, but dark enough she had problems to see properly. She wondered how he could see where he was stepping, but then she remembered that he was used to watch the corridors at nights. His eyes were trained to see in the dark.
Thick clouds hung above them, causing the darkness to appear more frightening. She was actually grateful that they shared his cloak, now that it was getting colder due to the night rising from the hills in the east. Her clothes were still wet and while his arm laid around her left shoulder had confused her at first, she was now welcoming the bit of warmth.
The castle came in sight. Dark silhouettes against a deep grey sky. No windows could be seen, apart from those of the Great Hall, which was lightened brightly. Each and everyone was at dinner. Everyone except her and the teacher all people in the warm hall disliked most. At least that was what she knew. Maybe Dumbledore liked him a little more than the others, but what did she know about that man Dumbledore anyway? She startled another time.
“I know I might, as said, ask too much of you. After all you are fourteen years old and therefore haven’t even only slightly experienced what it feels like to Apparate.”
“I’ve travelled with Floo powder. I was told it feels very similar.”, he stopped walking, forcing her to do the same if she wasn’t to tear herself from his grip.
“All right. How many times have you done that?”, they looked at each other.
“A couple of times?”
“Very well. Just be aware that the first time will be a bit more tense than Floo powder.”
“But Sir – no one can Apparate within, into or out of the castle grounds – ”
“Guess, I did read that book as well. I was not talking about Apparition, but flight.”, he frowned. “You really are young.”, he added subdued, looking at the castle again.
“Oh.”, she didn’t seem to have heard the addition. “You can – ”
“Well, it has been a while since I took someone with me when flying and that person was excellent at Apparating. Used to do it silently. Not many people can do it without even a little noise. But from all you are capable of already, I sense you are as gifted as this person had been at your age. From this I can gladly say, or rather hope, that you might be – as – brilliant in your future.”
“Professor? What are you – ”, she got curious.
“If you excuse me,”
“Sir?”
He turned to her, flinging his second arm around her back, making her hands grab his shoulders unintentionally. With a short shriek pressed from her lungs, she noticed her feet losing ground, her whole body feeling as if being liquefied.
Rushing in a fog-like greyish black mass of whirls, the trees moved past beneath them faster than Harry when playing Quidditch. There was the long roofed bridge, a short glimpse on one of the yards and they were already moving straight upwards. She didn’t get to see the window of the third-year-girls’ dormitory opening before she already found herself standing next to Lavender Brown’s empty bed, still in his arms, panting heavily, shaking more than in the forest, eyes widely opened with both shock and surprise.
“If you sense the need to vomit, go for it.”, he woke her from her bewilderedness. “Just – don’t chose me as your target.”, she swallowed heavily and looked him straight in the eyes, as properly as it was possible.
The room was even darker than the forest and completely disappeared into black when she gazed at his pale face, framed by the hood and tousled black hair. His dark eyes stared back, surrounded with black lashes and topped by thick but not messy male brows. Sure that she could stand on her own, he let go, pulling his cloak off her when moving away. Immediately the cold of the night took in the place of the fabric and she noticed that her lips started to tremble as well. She watched him walking directly towards her trunk.
“Undress.”, he said curtly.
“What?”, it was rather a squeak than a question.
“I said, undress.”, he repeated emotionless. “If you stay in those wet clothes, you will get a terrible cold.”
Snorting, she did as ordered, glad that he had turned away from her. She had already stripped down to her underwear when he turned around, two of her freshly washed towels on one arm. With a flick of his free hand, two empty chairs moved next to the round oven in the middle of the room, facing one another. Then he threw the smaller towel in Hermione’s direction, which she could just catch it.
“For your hair.”, he said monotonous and closed the window with another wave of his hand, watching her wrapping her hair with the towel and putting her arms around her upper body again. “And the rest?”, he sighed.
“Rest?”, she saw him rolling his eyes
“And I thought you were the most intelligent girl currently attending Hogwarts. If you don’t get off your wet underwear as well, you will still get sick.”, he snorted and walked back to her, leaving a little less than a yard between them. “You are not the first girl I would see naked, as strange as this might appear to you.”, he continued with a rather bored expression, his head slightly tilted to the left, but she just stared up at him, not sure what to think about the whole embarrassing situation. “Miss Granger,”, he hissed quietly, pushing back his hood with his free hand at last, turning his hair into a total mess, “I am your teacher! Do you really think, I am that perverted?”
Hermione swallowed once more and took off the last two pieces of clothing, noticing with relief that he looked away now as well. There was not even time for her to get angry. Once all of her clothes laid on the floor, he wrapped her in the big towel and gently pushed her down on one of the chairs. A last wave of his hand and cracking fire in the oven cast the dark room in a warm orange. He finally took off his cloak and hung it around the other chair, facing one of the windows. Now unveiled, she could examine the clothes he wore beneath. It was one of his usual black robes. Knee length, from the hip down opened in front and sewn pleated at the back, closed with many – clasps – on his chest. Most of his robes had buttons, but this one had two rows of wound silver clasps, one being decoration. As always, the sleeves reached his knuckles, leaving a short stripe of his white shirt to stick out. The same white rim could be seen on his neck, covered by the high, tight collar of the robe.
He picked up her clothes and hung them onto the bar around the oven for drying them. Then he sat down in front of her, crossing his arms and legs, looking at the fire behind the iron. His elegant black shoes and seams of his black trousers had gotten a bit dirty while walking back from the forest. Other than that; and the completely disarranged thick hair; his appearance was as neat, as sleek as ever.
The warmth of the fire in the iron oven comforted her more with every minute they sat there in silence. He didn’t take his eyes off the oven – and she – attempted to do the same. But as much as she tried, she couldn’t resist looking at him. She had never seen him in thoughts like that. Face blank to the last minuscule muscle he stared at what she believed to be the dancing flames behind the slits in the metal. Finding him so calm and without any spark of despise thrown at her, felt good. Though somehow he also looked like a doll, a display dummy, still, lifeless – dead. A sudden urge to break the silence overcame her.
“Sir – ”, he didn’t even startle, just as though he had been expecting her to raise her voice at the very moment.
“They won’t be here within the next hour. By that time you will be dry and asleep.”, she frowned. “Are you hungry?”
“Pardon?”
“I asked you whether – ”, Snape finally directed his face at her.
“No, Sir.”, his expression didn’t change, but she saw a hint of doubt in his eyes. “Really.”, he nodded barely visible and turned his head back to the oven.
“Professor – why – ”
“What by all means were you thinking?”, it was neither a lecture, nor concern. “Walking out into the woods with Dementors all around the grounds?”
“I – don’t know.”, she decided not to try building up a fast and convincing lie like back then after Harry and Ron had knocked down the troll in the lavatory or when they had been caught finding Mrs Norris’ petrified body, or – “I didn’t even notice I was – ”
“Apparently not.”, he took a deep breath through his nose.
“Sir?”
“Yes?”, she hesitated for a moment, swallowing.
“Thank you.“
He didn’t move his head, but his eyes rushed towards her, drilling into hers. Then they flicked down to some non-existing point in height of her shoulder. With a sigh, they closed and he nodded lightly.
“Sometimes we load too much upon ourselves.”, he opened his eyes again, looking at the fireplace once more. “Don’t think you need to prove anything. Professor McGonagall won’t slice you and have you for dinner if you hand it back.”
“You – know?”, she aspirated. “Oh. Of course. You must have heard about my full timetable and considered that – ”
“What did she tell you? Stories about the Ministry? About tons of letters and owls and agreements?”
“Sir?”, Snape chuckled, a sparse smile on his lips – that self-satisfied one he always pulled when giving students the lesson of their life for mistakes normal people would take as too small as to be necessary to bother.
“Convincing, isn’t she?”, his smile was gone as fast as it had come.
“I don’t understand – ”
“Do you believe, the Minister would tolerate what you are doing? They have destroyed Time-Turners in a big manner. Such are dangerous. One of the most dangerous and most tempting objects ever created by wizards. Even more dangerous than that little stone Nicolas Flamel had made so long ago. But I am certain, you are aware of the facts. You did a great job for the past two months. Though if I may remind you, you will need to continue as concentrated until June, at least. If you ever dare to allow yourself a mistake like today again, I fear you will not come to survive until Christmas.”, he snarled. “I cannot be there all the time to save your neck. It was mere coincidence that I walked across that yard and saw two of the Dementors flying towards the woods behind the bridge.”
“I know. Sorry, Professor.”, again, his head and eyes were on her.
“Don’t be silly now!”, he hissed. “You shouldn’t apologise to me, but rather to yourself!”
Hermione just bit her lower lip and looked away into the barely lit room. However, she couldn’t resist staring back at him when he pulled out that little pouch again, rummaging. With a snort he pulled his wand from his left sleeve, pointed it inside the pouch and a small flask with a glass stopper soared out, staying floating in front of him. A clatter and he closed the pouch, slightly amused by her interested face. After putting the pouch back into his pocket, he picked the flask and leaned over to her, holding it in front of her nose, above which their eyes met, and their noses would have been dangerously close, if it hadn’t been for the flask.
“Four drops in a cup of water. That will do for a dreamless night of eight hours.”, she nodded, understanding and attempted to take it. “If you are about to run out of it, just come to my office after dinner and knock – four times.”
“Okay.”, she nodded again and took the flask, whereby their hands barely touched and she shuddered slightly, even though his fingers were surprisingly warm.
Eyes empty, he raised and threw on his cloak, leaving her sitting on the chair. But she wouldn’t let him go just like that.
“What will I tell the others?”, she asked just to get one more moment for thinking, yet in vain.
“The truth.”, he sighed, his back on her and his hand on the door handle. “You weren’t hungry.”, she nodded another time. “Remember – speak to no one. Neither about your little suicide trip – nor about what happened this evening. Not even to me. Four knocks and your face in my door after I opened shall be enough of the words dropped on the matter.”, he pushed down the handle. “Good night, Miss Granger.”
“Goodnight, Professor.”, he stepped out, being about to close the door behind him. “Professor?”, he stopped. “Thank you for – everything.”
Without turning back, he shut the door and actually left her sitting next to the oven, covered only in her light blue towels, holding a flask of potion. Several long minutes passed, only spent with staring at the door. Then she stood up quietly, put the flask on her bedside table and started drying her hair magically.
Dressed for bed, regretting for a second that she hadn’t asked for food, she transformed a piece of parchment into a ceramic cup, filled it with water and dripped in four drops of the potion he had given her, which she stowed away in her trunk afterwards.
Before sitting down on the bed, she took her dried clothes from the bar and threw them carelessly into the trunk. Then, after turning off the fire with a wave of her wand, she sat at last down on the mattress, eyeing the cup for another long while. Thinking of his words, she took a deep breath and drank it all in one go. It didn’t taste bad even. Sighing, she laid down and as soon as she had managed to cover herself with her blankets, she fell asleep, drifting off into a black nowhere.
Outside, in the darkness between the door and the stairs to the Gryffindor common room, a big ginger cat purred along with the brushes of a pale hand that glided over its thick fur. Once the hand was gone, the cat laid down and curled in, guarding the door until the first of Hermione’s colleagues would come to go to bed as well.
~~#~~
The following weekend would be all she had hoped for. No homework, no essays, no research to do. But being her, she couldn’t confess publicly that she enjoyed the thought. And with Ron greeting her right after that wonderful dreamless sleep with a sneaky face, she wished to go back up to her new miracle tonic.
“Where were you yesterday?”, he chuckled.
“I wasn’t hungry.”
“Sure. Having no work left to do must make you really depressed. Why don’t you help Harry and me with our stuff?”
“Literally meaning, I shall do all your homework, yes? No, thanks, Ronald.”, she snorted and sat down right when Harry entered the scene, looking as depressed as Ron would have expected Hermione to be. “Oh no – we’ll be going to Hogsmeade today, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Good morning.”, Harry mumbled, trying to sound normal.
“Don’t look so sad. We’ll bring you lots of sweets back from Honeydukes.”, said Hermione, being desperately sorry for him and catching her brain creating the taste of dark chocolate filled with spearmint cream in her mouth – by that moment she knew that it wouldn’t be easy to forget the events of the previous evening.
Before leaving the hall with her friends, she; out of curiosity; tried to catch a glimpse of the staff table without being noticed. Though to her shock, her eyes met with Snape’s and she turned at once, following the others outside. Had he been watching her? Or had it been – mere coincidence again?
However, she wouldn’t find out. Having guessed it then already, but for good reasons not really having hoped for it, the rest of the school year would keep her too busy and the only moments that could make her think properly about the evening in question, were those when she got to see him standing in the half opened door of his office, silent and callous, only handing another serving to her, taking back the empty flask before closing the door.
Just in those rare moments she would thoroughly think back and wonder which side of that mysterious man she had met with that night before Hallowe’en in nineteen ninety-three.
~~#~~
Clothes and hair soaking from sweat, panting like a wild ox and his heart throbbing in his throat, he spied around the corner, only five minutes after having left the house. No one to be seen. Everything was quiet, apart from the wind’s exhausted sigh that attempted to sweep away the sweltering heat of the day. All workers were slogging behind the walls of the many buildings on the other side of the high wire mesh fence. Still as quick as a fly, he hurried across the sandy soil of the fringe around the factory area and stopped with the pale right hand against the netted iron, eyes like marbles wandering up to the top, where a helical barbed wire searched its way along the border, snakelike and ominous, electrified wires woven in, for keeping animals and nosy kids off. He could feel it prickle.
Yet not enough to stop him. Not this time. He had tried the gates too often. In the distance, he could see the guards and the least thing he wanted to do was persuade them again – or run all the way through the premises, his eyes hurting from the dust. No, this time he would be taking –
Biting down his doubt, he hooked his fingers and bare toes onto the wire and climbed. Taut enough to resist his little weight, the fence didn’t give the faintest rattling as he mounted it, ignoring the tickling on his skin. At last he reached the spiral on top. Only fearing his wide clothes might get caught, he gave it another checking glance, then his thin fingers wrapped themselves around spike-free parts of the wound wire, which slightly gave in, however, to his advantage. He pulled himself up, through between the gap he had pressed open, and the wire downright catapulted him onto the other side, where he rolled himself off in the air already and landed gently on the ground.
Unfortunately, the wire clattered back in place and as soon as they perceived the noise, two dogs in the near hut answered with ear-splitting barking and the rusty iron door was thrust open, revealing the big Doberman Pinschers, pulling on thick rattling chains that were held on broad leather rims, each in the knobby hands of a no less grim, heavy weighted bold man with a flourishing brown moustache. His muscular arms were covered in tattooed skulls and other dark motives, up to the straps of his dirty wife beater and it was not clear whether it had been his own dogs that had torn his bagging jeans. Baring his yellow teeth alike, he looked at whom his dogs were longing for digging theirs in. But unimpressed, also by the man’s angry growling, he sidestepped, sped towards a barrel and pulled himself up onto the corrugated iron roof of the hut, before the man could finish his thronging sentence.
“Wha’ the hell ya think ya’re doin’ in – Jesus Chris’ – ge’cha bums back down ’ere!”
“Only as lon’ as ye keep yer cuties at bay.”, snarled the boy, his own teeth well visible too. “Make ’em shu’ up, or I will.”
“Ya?”, chuckled the man. “Firs’ see how ya ge’ back down ’ere. Then we le’ the dogs decide.”
“Look, I dun’ wan’ attention – ”
“Neither do I.”, growled the guard. “I’ll tell yar Dad ya’re sneakin’ ’round in ’ere,”
“Well, I’d spare ye tha work an’ tell ’im meself. I’m ’eadin’ fer ’im,”
“Jus’ a lil’ lippy for a ten-year ol’, are we? Yeah, with me, and ya both off the area in the fas’-lane.”, he laughed maliciously.
“We’ll see who laughs las’.”
The boy’s breath became steadier when his eyes focused on the still barking dog at his left. It took its owner several seconds to realise the dog had calmed down, eyes connected with the boy’s. Then the dog rushed around and went for the other, knocking it and the man almost to the ground.
“Wha’ the – ”, gasped the bold, irate but confused by the twist, though only seconds and a commanding call of the boy later, the dogs stopped fighting and sat down calmly on the sandy ground as if nothing had ever happened between them, but they were bleeding where they had bitten one another.
“An’ now, if ye dun’ wan’ me ter do tha’ wit’ ye,”, the boy said calm, gaining the man’s attention and eye contact again, “Ye grab yer dogs, lead ’em back in an’ continue listenin’ ter yer radio. If anyone asks, tha heat’s made tha dogs freak ou’, tha’s all. An’ I’m eigh’.”
A purely malevolent but satisfied smirk wandered across the boy’s lips as the man picked up the leather belts and led the dogs back in by their chains, calm and obeying. When the door fell shut, exhaustion won, making the boy collapse on the roof, his sweat covered pale face losing its blush behind the salty water glistening in the summer sun. Along with wiping off his sweat, he robbed a pulsating vein at his temple and his slightly aching head. Drained but happy with himself, he sat back up and gazed along the cable that connected the hut to a transformer. More electricity. He panted out his frustration. But he had wanted it that way, now he had to do it that way.
Some minutes passed in which he slightly cooled down, even though the wide jacket over the too big shirt refused to let in any cooling gust of a breeze. Composed enough, he stood up and cautiously climbed onto the swaying and bending cable, waiting for it to come to rest, with his toes hooked around and his hands on his hips. Ready for what laid ahead, he walked on as if he was balancing on a mere wooden board on solid ground. He had trained it several times before, on rather straight cables. Due to having to get up higher onto the transformer, he gained speed and the last yards he passed running and climbing at once, safely reaching the metal frame that stood in its own secured area on the premise.
His further way was easier: down another cable and over some high factory roofs, up and down, up the slopes and a jump down after each. Three buildings onwards, he finally reached the high brick chimney. The building around was locked, that much he knew, and too many people were working in there for entering uncaught. To his fortune, there was no smoke emerging from the chimney. So he jumped over and climbed the iron bars of the maintenance ladder, higher and higher, until he reached the square vent and peeked down inside. Very far below, he could see light. His chance. He swung himself over and fell, too small to touch the fuliginous bricks around him and his breath held for not inhaling too many of the particles.
At the bottom, he slowed down like he had before, landing almost gentle on the grid. Though the scarce light and soot made it almost impossible for him to see, someone must have noticed his arrival. To his left, an inner maintenance door was being opened and in peered a most familiar face, first confused and on the realisation, slightly angry.
“Ey, Dad!”, beamed the boy, but his father’s expression was far from amused.
“Screw i’! Wha’cha think you’re doin’, eh? I jus’ wanne’ ta fire u’ tha engine again! Lucky bastar’!”
“Ye fergo’ yer meal,”, huffed the boy and retrieved two strangely intact looking packages of brown paper from the inner pockets of his jacket.
“As if I din’ know. ’S tha’ all?”
“An a letter came fer ye.”, his son pulled out the envelope as well. “Though’ ye wanted ter read it before ye’re too drunk after shif’.”
“You per’ly lil’ smar’-aleck! See tha’cha ge’ ou’ o’ ’ere! Before you ge’ me sack’, you freak!”
“Yes, Sir.”, grumbled the boy, slipped out of the chimney past his upset father and left the narrow boiler room through another ventilation shaft. “An’ it’s `thank ye´. When I go’ children, I’d thank ’em fer bringin’ me me fergotten lunch. No matter ’ow shor’ an’ easy or far an’ complicated ’eir way was.”
While he marched through the dark corridors and up many stairs, the definite resolution from his childhood resounded in his head with his own, much younger voice and the hatred flooded his body, for his father and even himself, not much fading when he reached the doors before his destination.
A dead cold laid over the sombre room, not as dead as the grim hills around the grounds, yet cold enough to make even a warmly dressed person shiver. Thick drops dashed against the high old windows, but an enchantment quietened the noise to grant better recovery. Not perceivable from the room, occasionally rain turned into snow where they crossed the down-pouring water.
Long hooded cloaks, slimy hands, the rest far beyond imagination. Appearing much like them, a shadow entered silent through the door. No noise as the figure glided over the floor, towards a white bed. A skeleton white hand reached out from the wide dark sleeve, taking a piece of wood that laid on the bedside table. The fingers lightly wrapped the cracked stick, a thumb trailing over the fibres. Then it was put back into place and the hand moved on, wiping a bundle of dark hair from a scar. Right in that moment, a lightning bolt shot over the sky and lightened the scene. But the hair slid down without waking the boy.
Gliding like the water over the glass, a wide mass of fabric slipped off dark shoulders and was carefully hung over a chair. Leaving shoes beside the bed, the figure climbed under the blanket, still not making the boy stir. He was so vast asleep he didn’t even notice his head being lifted and an arm being laid around him. A second. Only when a pair of lips softly met with his forehead next to the scar, he would give a sniff and a quiet moan when it was replaced by another forehead. The touch too gentle, he slept on, only drifting into a far more pleasant dream.
Unseen in the dark, a smile, so warm and happy, every Dementor would flee from it..
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