Chapter Six

Disclaimer: Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Harry Potter belong to their respective creators, Joss Whedon and J.K. Rowling.

Author's Warning: major AU.



She couldn't stand up.

Buffy gritted her teeth, set both hands on the bed, and pushed—only to collapse back, gasping, at the pain in her neck and head.

Her legs lay against the side of the bed, loose, slack, as if they were unconnected to her knees. At the touch, they were firm, warm, yet her flesh, when she tried to move, tried to flex her muscles, was wooden and lifeless.

“The bite was shallow, only a quarter of an inch,” the Headmaster had told her. “Severus assures me that the venom injected was negligible, else it would have been quite fatal. You came very close, Miss Summers.”

Except Buffy remembered. She remembered the body of the snake, thicker than her arm, whipping forward, the hooded head striking low, its two, knife-gashed eyes streaking blood and black, smeared bits, the mouth opening wide. She remembered what it felt like as the fangs, two inches long, sank to the roots in her flesh, the burning agony of the venom as it met her blood.

The punctures were only small, red marks now. Her side was still mostly numb but beginning to ache, whatever painkiller they had given her wearing off. The fever had died, the dizziness lessened, and Buffy was feeling the first pangs of hunger, which was always a sign of recovery for her.

Only her legs would not move.

Of her clothes, the only things they had been able to salvage had been her leather jacket and her boots. They lay, cleaned, in the chair beside the bed that Remus had occupied. The pants, shirt, underwear, and bra had all been too torn, too bloodied, or too soaked in venom to do anything with but burn.

Buffy wondered what they’d done with her knife.

Professor Mickey had also brought her a towel, a toothbrush, and a comb, and shown her the door in one side of the room, between two empty beds. She had then left, telling her she would be back in perhaps an hour.

Now Buffy couldn’t stand up.

No. She set her jaw, dug her fingernails into the flesh of her palms. She would do this. She had to do this.

When she levered herself up onto her feet, holding on to the side table but putting all of her weight on her legs, Buffy nearly blacked out from the intensity of the pain. The knuckles of her fingers whitened from the stain and she tasted blood where she’d bitten her lip, but then one foot edged forward, the other followed, and she was limping down the length of her bed, staggering, her hands clutching at the blankets, and by the time she reached the foot, sweating and gasping with effort, the feeling was coming back into her legs like molten metal being poured into her bones.

Her underwear, the towel, and the toothbrush were in her arm. At the door, Buffy stopped to catch her breath, and leaned against the wall, feeling the torture of her leg subsiding into something was almost bearable.

The bathroom was wide and spacious, walled and floored in clean white stone, but very bare. Several candles, set into different niches in the wall, gave off a gentle, pearly glow. There was no shower, only a large bath sunk into the floor, with three taps at one end. It was already filled with steaming water.

The white shift they had put her in two days ago smelled of sweat, poison, and a body that had been sick for a long time. Buffy stripped it off without hesitation, and then wasn’t sure whether or not to be embarrassed that there was nothing under it. The bandaging came off without trouble, and then she stood in front of a mirror set above the sink, staring at the place where the giant cobra had bitten her.

The flesh was stark white, lifeless. Beneath her fingers, it felt stiff and hard, like plastic, and the punctures glared uncannily red. They had been daubed, she saw, with some kind of sweet-smelling ointment.

Vampire bite, she thought.

Her hand went up to her throat. Buffy turned her head, her eyes going from her stomach to the arch of her exposed neck.

Nothing.

Her skin, pale, sweat-stained, stretched smooth and unbroken, unblemished, from ear to shoulder.

Buffy looked up.

Pale. Empty. The face she looked into, the face that was her own, could have been a doll’s.

The water was blistering hot, the soap from the middle tap an essence of tea rose. When she pulled herself, dripping and scrubbed red, out of the tub, all the feeling in her legs had come back, and she felt, as she walked to where she’d dropped the towel, almost human again.

Her teeth brushed, skin chafed dry, hair pulled back, Buffy stood at the door, wrapped in the towel, and hesitated. From the other side, from inside the room, she heard someone moving, heard the rustle of cloth. Quickly, she glanced around the bathroom, looking for something, anything, but unless she broke the wooden handle of the toothbrush in half and used the jagged end to stab, there wasn’t really anything useful. She decided that, in a tight spot, she could always use her towel to strangle anything with a neck.

Opening the door, she walked out.

Someone had stoked up the fire. The room was filled with bright, yellow light, and a smell of burning wood.

Remus was standing beside her bed, laying a handful of black cloth out on the blankets. He turned at the sound of the door opening, mouth beginning to form the shape of her name, and then he was still, his lips parted slightly, his eyes fixed on her.

Buffy stood very, very still.

He had such a strange look on his face.

His eyes, she saw, were actually brown.

Abruptly, Remus turned, facing away. His hand, at his side, was clenched.

“Professor McGonagall,” he said, and his voice was completely, totally normal. “She had this pressed for you. I’m afraid we couldn’t find any quite your size, but…”

The black cloth, Buffy noticed, was actually a robe, with a collar and sleeves. It looked…really big.

“Thanks,” she said.

She thought he might leave, then, walk out the door to let her dress, but he didn’t. Instead, he stood there, back turned, hesitating, as if he had something left to say.

“I have your knife,” he said. Not looking back. “I…couldn’t really carry it around with me, so I’ve…left it in my own rooms. When you’ve been given yours, I’ll get it to you.”

Why did he sound so…distressed? It was just a knife. Buffy didn’t understand what was going on, or what he was trying to say. So she said nothing.

“I’ll let you finish dressing, then,” he finished, and, still without having even glanced at her again, went out.

The robe was maybe three sizes too big for her, but clean and warm. The collar came up too high and the sleeves hung down too low, and the hem was barely high enough to keep from dragging on the floor, but that was only if she was careful. The shoulders were too wide. It did, however, cover every inch of her but her face.

There was nothing to be done for underwear. Either they had all forgotten, or it just hadn’t occurred to anyone. It was a little unsettling, not to mention distracting, to put the robe on without anything beneath it, but at least the cloth was thick and she was clean. Combing out her hair, Buffy thought of her suitcase, lying in the dirt somewhere in a field, or crushed, maybe, onto the tracks.

She felt so naked. She didn’t even have any lotion or lip balm to put on, or deodorant, for that matter. They had that here, right? Christ, what if they didn’t?

God, her suitcase. If only she’d grabbed her suitcase.

Buffy was slipping on her boots when the door opened and Professor Mickey stepped in.

“Miss Summers,” said Professor Mickey with stiff politeness. “Good, you’re dressed.” She surveyed Buffy with a critical eye. “A little old-fashioned, that thing, but still in very decent condition. I’m glad I remembered where it was—I hadn’t thought of it for years, not since it was discovered in the washroom and I put it away the first time.”

Buffy couldn’t think what else to say but “Thank you.”

“Of course, Miss Summers,” said Professor Mickey. She paused. “Mr. Williamson has been sent off to bed,” she continued, more quietly. “Most of those to be involved have been gathered. They are waiting on us, Miss Summers. If you are ready?”

Buffy nodded.

The professor led her out of the hospital wing, stopping to close and lock the door behind them. Even as the key turned, Buffy heard, from inside, the whisper and scurry of small feet against the floor, quick and near-noiseless, and the muted pitch of soft, high voices.

Remus stood waiting outside. He had regained his composure, though he still looked very strained, and offered Buffy a cautious smile, which she did not return.

“The students are in their Common Rooms,” Professor Mickey whispered now. “Come.”

The halls were dark, and quiet, lit at intervals only by small, glass lamps, filled with pale, flickering light and long, sighing echoes. The faint light gleamed off of pieces of the suits of polished armor that lined the walls, or the gilded edges of the frames of paintings. The walls were occasionally broken by a closed door or a hanging rug. The floors were mostly stone, the air damp and chilled.

Buffy’s head filled with whispers. She didn’t look, she only stared straight ahead, but she still saw, out of the corners of her eyes, how some of the figures in the paintings seemed to move, how their eyes seemed to follow her, and she heard the distant noise of voices, whispering, whispering, from one painted mouth to another. Where they should have been alone, the halls were filled with moving figures, turning with them as they passed, a hundred painted heads following them as they walked.

Professor Mickey didn’t speak, and neither did Remus, though he glanced at her now and then. Buffy shut her mouth and didn’t mention it, even when, as they went by an archway that led into a different hall, she saw, in the corner of her eye, in the darkness, a white, ghostly figure, hovering close to one wall, a gaunt, wracked face, its gibbous eyes on her.

They went along several different hallways, until finally they came to one, large staircase, which Professor Mickey took. It led to another floor, where several other stairwells branched away into the dark, and the professor took the middle. She and Remus seemed to know exactly where they were going. Buffy supposed that was to be expected, if they were both professors here.

The second stairwell, which was narrow and dark, the steps short and strait, seemed to go higher and higher without break or end, and there were windows set into the curving stone. Buffy looked out of one as they ascended past it, but the sky was black with clouds, and a slow rain was falling. She caught a glimpse of the gleaming surface of a large body of water, stippled with falling rain, the sweep of treetops, and then she turned back again, ignoring the windows from then on.

At one point her foot went right through the step she could see. Her body compensated instantaneously, her muscles contracting as she began pulling her foot back, as her balance reasserted itself, but then a hand took her elbow, steadying her, and it was so unexpected that she stumbled anyway.

“Careful,” whispered Remus. “Some of the steps aren’t always there.”

Through the cloth, she could feel the heat of his hand, his grip. She felt how his fingers tightened without his meaning them to, felt the way his breath caught, and when she looked at him, his eyes gleamed yellow.

“Thanks,” she whispered awkwardly, and straightened, her hair brushing his arm.

At the top of the stairs, there was a door. Professor Mickey stopped there, knocked, the thud of her knuckles on the wood muted strangely, and then leaned close, murmuring under her breath.

The door swung open, soundless.

“We are here,” said the professor, and went through.

Buffy stood there, looking up at the opening. There was, from within the room, a faint, flickering light. She could hear nothing, however, not even Professor Mickey’s breathing or heartbeat, and the magic was crawling over her skin. Behind her, Remus moved, his body stiffening, and she knew he was stopping himself from putting out his arm, from touching her, protecting her.

“There is nothing to be afraid of,” he whispered instead, and she heard the truth in it.

Nodding to show that she had heard, knowing that she had come too far to turn back anyway, Buffy tensed her shoulders, lifted her chin, and passed through the door.