In Need

A/N - FYI I did some edits to the last chapter that I\'ll be putting up after I post this and the next one tonight. Basically the same, but I put it up in kind of a rush and didn\'t like it when I re-read it.

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The Call


Megan gripped the sides of the sink and stared at herself in the mirror. A wan and shaky reflection stared back at her. She gripped the edges of the cold marble basin harder, her knuckles whitening. “Get. it. under. control,” she scolded, and forced herself to breathe deeply, shivering as she sucked in the cool dungeon air.


Tonight’s experiment to test Severus’ formula had been a sore trial for her and had succeeded in loosening the old fears that she constantly and automatically worked to press down tightly into unconsciousness. She had seemed like the obvious candidate to try the co-apparation marker before they distributed them among the Order and had readily agreed to try it, expecting nothing out of the ordinary. What actually happened, though, had been a most unwelcome and unpleasant discovery - resisting the pull toward Voldemort’s relentless beckoning had made her a nervous wreck.


The experience had been painful to both mind and body, and the harder she fought it the weaker it made her. The activation of her mark had been more than a signal - it seemed to stir dreadful sensations of slow hideous whispers in an undertone with faster and more insistent mutterings in the foreground. The initial burning sensation of the mark spread and pulsed through her, and her usual mode of pushing discomfort aside could not work because there was no part of her that she could retreat to that was not affected by it.


Albus had managed to provide some relief of the twisting and burning of the dreadful invisible tug by helping hold Megan in place when exhaustion took over in her struggle to do it alone, but the only real improvement came when Voldemort finally released the death eaters from the meeting that night. Once released along with them, she had stumbled numbly back to her quarters, trying to avoid the curious glances of the students, and was now racing against the clock to get a grip on herself. Severus would be back any moment and she didn’t want him to see her distress when he got home. “He has enough to worry about,” she reprimanded the face that looked hollowly back at her from the mirror. “Come *on* now - is *this* what you want him to see when he walks through that door? After an evening at one of those meetings he doesn’t need to play nursemaid to you too. Just deal with it.”


Megan’s pulse finally slowed to normal, obeying a lifetime of learning to keep up appearances, and her breathing evened out. The fear and sadness was pressed down out of the way and joined the collection that had accumulated inside of her for seventeen years. Times like these never seemed to offer any opportunities to sort through it, and the good times let her forget that such a collection existed.


She ran a quick hand through her hair to tidy it and rinsed away the sour taste in her mouth. As she patted her cheeks to bring some color back into them, she flashed her trademark smile very convincingly at the mirror. As Severus walked through the door, Megan turned to greet him, all visible traces of anxiety removed.


~~**~~

After Severus fell asleep, Megan quietly slipped out of bed and padded in sock feet through the castle corridors, carrying her running shoes in one hand. “Cut it out, Peeves. I’m not in the mood,” she said as she caught sight of the poltergeist lurking around a corner. She didn’t know what he was up to, but experience dictated that it would undoubtedly be obnoxious. Just the other night, she had only narrowly avoided him dropping a whole bag of confiscated stink pellets on her head. She frowned and made a mental note to create a lesson plan for her second and third years to deal with poltergeistd usd use him as the guinea pig.


Once outside, she laced up her shoes and took off, not bothering to warm up or stretch. She pounded her feet along, covering the ground swiftly and ignoring the stitch pinching her side - she just had to run. After tiring herself out with laps around the quidditch pitch, she sat down on the wide steps of the castle entrance, took her running shoes off, and did a cleansing spell on them. Moving silently back to her quarters, she quietly stowed her gear in the wardrobe. Checking to see that Severus was still asleep, she showered and changed, and as the sun peeked over the horizon, she sat down at her writing table with a cup of tea and the post.


Severus woke up and sleepily gazed at Megan for a few minutes before getting out of bed. He came over and kissed her on the head, gently tousling her now-noticeably-green hair. “Good morning, love.”


He picked up her tea and helped himself to a sip. “More letters?”


“No, still reading them from the last bundle.”


Megan put aside her reading and stood up to embrace him. A sudden swell of love pulsed through her with each beat of her heart, nearly causing her to break into tears that she wouldn’t have known how to explain. She pressed her long hands over his shoulders and back, feeling the bumps and lines of his scars under her fingertips. They were like a map of him, almost like morbid constellations sprinkled across his skin, which if named, would have to be called such things as ‘Twelfth Drunken Beating of the Year,’ ‘Muggles Who Will Never Remember That They Ever Saw You,’ and ‘Voldemort’s Summer Spite.’


Severus had gotten more scars since Megan had known him, and she was thankful only that none had come lately. Severus’ scars had, over time, been added to the motivations dictated by the invisible scars cut into her heart long ago when the death eaters killed her parents. While covering up her scars was long since automatic to her, they nonetheless drove her unconsciously forward in a constant attempt to quash her vulnerabilities. All she ultimately cared about was keeping the people that she loved safe and happy no matter what, because losing anyone else that she loved was simply of tof the question. If she had ever considered it logically, the futility of such an expectation would have been blindingly clear, but the heart is rarely a rational organ and only knows what it needs.


~~**~~

Right from the time that she had come to live with them, the Waters’ noticed Megan’s fierce vigilance. During the early years, they tried to soften her edges and channel some of her energy into more sociable pursuits than magical education and personal fortification. Music turned out to be one such outlet that Megan took to readily, and it had the additional benefit of becoming a way for her to express her deeper feelings - something which had been nearly impossible for her since her parents’ death. Public life and society had been another such outlet. Being a gregarious person by nature, it seemed helpful for Megan to have the distraction and influence of carefree playmates, and her occasional slipup with them about her particular heritage was easily brushed off as make-believe.


The Waters’ had accumulated many years’ worth of unfulfilled wishes about what they wanted to provide for a child, and they possessed an abundance of resources with which to live out those dreams. They quickly grew attached to Megan and exceeded Albus Dumbledore’s hopes about their providing the comfortable and safe home for her that he could not. As Megan grew to love John and Alison Waters in rn, rn, it became important to her to put an end to the worried looks and hushed discussions that they had about her - it meant occasionally needing to push feelings down to hide them, but facing the especially difficult ones was something she preferred to avoid anyway.


~~**~~

Severus had noticed Megan’s fierce protectiveness toward himself right away. While he found it charming and touching at the beginning of their friendship, he also found it quite unnecessary. When grew to know her well enough to realize that her ostensible bravado was actually an almost reckless sincerity to be at his side through literally anything, his alarm had quieted her outward persistence and he believed her apparent acquiescence to be the end of the matter. After all, he reasoned, Megan had a good head on her shoulders and ought to know that he was far better prepared to face the dangers of the dark arts than she. His life had been lived much differently than hers, and he strongly believed that her sheltered and privileged existence made her much more vulnerable against the trials of malevolence that he was accustomed to facing regularly. It had worried him immensely to imagine the trouble she could find herself in if she wasn’t careful - he wished only for her to be happy and longed for the end of the confrontation with Voldemort so that he could provide her with a life that didn’t involve such constant grim realities.


~~**~~

Albus Dumbledore saw, in many ways, a reflection of his younger self in Megan’s need to watch over everything. The tired and aging leader in him was glad to have her capable presence by his side. The uncle in him couldn’t wait for the whole thing to be finished so she could pick up her life where he had asked her to leave it off. He had, over the years, occasionally felt torn about his decision ten years ago that had brought her to her current placement at Hogwarts and in the resistance against Voldemort. He hoped that the time would not be far off that her promise to him would be fulfilled and she could leave the concerns that came along with it behind her.


Dumbledore’s brow creased as he watchegan gan pick at her breakfast, carefully disguising another night without sleep.


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Harry walked back from the quidditch stadium after training with Viktor. He smiled as the events of the night before ran through his mind, and he hoped to have some time alone with Ginny later on so they could talk about it. She had given him knowing smile and wink at breakfast this morning, but their separate class schedules and clusters of schoolmates around them all the time prevented any real exchange.


Sex. He’d had sex. He’d had sex with Ginny. He who had barely been able to talk to a girl on a date had now been with a woman, *and* it had been a good time for both of them. Just fooling around with Ginny was always fun, no question, but there was that something extra about thhat hat seemed to put a bit of spring back into his step and seem to make the weight of burdburden a bit less noticeable. As Harry once again played through the encounter in his mind, he nearly jumped out of his skin when Ron’s voice spoke up right next to him. “Jeez, Harry - what’s wrong with you? Didn’t you hear me calling? Or did you think it would be fun to make me chase you all the way back to the bloody castle?”


Ron was flushed and out of breath, and his eyes nwed wed suspiciously as he saw an almost guilty expression cross Harry’s face. “Uh - sorry,” Harry said. “Didn’t hear you - what are you doing out here? I thought Professor Waters had you training with Neville and Tonks.”


“I was training,” Ron replied, “but we went through three rounds well enough to leave a little bitly. ly. I’m beat now, though, and could really use a break from this place. You fancy a trip to Hogsmeade?”


Harry paused. He hadn’t spent much time with Ron lately, and could see by the look on his face that he really wanted to go. Harry knew that while he and Hermione had finally started speaking again, things were still awkward and the structure of their friendship really seemed to have changed. He agreed to go, and made a mental note to ask Ginny to meet up with him later.


~~**~~

Harry grabbed Ron’s arm as he noticed three centaurs coming out of the Forbidden Forest and cantering toward Firenze’s grotto. He recognized the large one in the lead with chestnut flanks as Madrigorian, a leader among the centaurs with a particular disregard for wizards. He and Hermione had only narrowly escaped from a confrontation with him years ago, and seeing him immediately raised concern for him about Firenze. He wondered what the lot of them were up to, knowing fully well that their disregard for wizards was only surpassed by the loathing they felt toward the one who had left them to live alongside the wizards. “We’d better go see what’s happening.”


“Er - shouldn’t we let Professor Dumbledore know about this? You remember what happened with Umbridge - I think that the last thing we need right now is another fight.”


“There’s no ,” s,” said Harry as he started to run up the hill toward them, “They’re almost there. Come on!”


~~**~~

As Harry and Ron approached the group of centaurs, Madrigorian halted and looked down at them menacingly. He stood about eight feet high, as did most of the centaurs, and his thick brows knitted into a threatening scowl. “What’s this, then? Is this not the man-brat who brought so much trouble upon Hi His voice boomed down over them, “Do you *dare* approach me?”


Harry steeled his nerves and willed his temper to stay cool. “We are just wondering what you are doing. Why have you left the forest?”


Immediately, there were three bows, drawn and aimed at Harry and Ron.


The black flanked wild-looking centaur that Harry recognized as Bane stepped forward and growled, “What business is it of yours, then? Step aside, wizards, or we may forget whose ground we tread.”


Harry bristled and set his jaw, his hand tightening around his wand. “If you have left the forest to come here, it becomes my business. Especially if you are ganging up on one of our professors, who - if I’m not mistaken - you have sworn to kill if you ever see him again.”


“Are you presuming,” snarled Madrigorian, “that we are nothing more than wild animals who are on some hunt to amuse ourselves? The arrogance of wizards never ceases to exceed itself! Stand aside this moment, or...”


Remus Lupin, upon hearing the commotion, stepped out of Firenze’s grotto and hastily approached the group. “Harry, Ron - what are you doing?”


Ron looked in surprise at him and said, “Us? We just wanted to make sure that they weren’t going to hurt Firenze.”


“Make sure that we weren’t going to hurt him?” roared Bane. “As if such creatures as yourselves could be a threat to the likes of us! Even if he is the outcast who has chosen to live among these creatures as a miserable pet, that does not -”


“Steady, Bane,” came the deep and solemn voice of the dappled gray that had not yet spoken, and who had now put his bow away. “Even in their wildness I detect the intention of sincerity, and they are more formidable than they appear. We will hold our peace, and if we have come all this way to speak once more with Firenze, then we had better do it and finish our business.”


Lupin looked relieved and nodded his head in greeting. “Diogenes. I thank you for contacting us and for agreeing to meet. We are most interested to hear what you have to say to us.”


~~**~~

Since his appointment to the Ministry of Magic’s Department for the Regulation of Magical Creatures, nothing had surprised him more than receiving a message from the leading council of the centaurs. The centaurs were a very old and learned race who typically scorned the Ministry and the presumption of humans in creating such an organization, and regarded their activities as being beneath the need for their attention. Their shared physical similarities to horses had been a point of contention since their contact with humans and their awareness of being regarded as half-breeds or as some type of talking beast of burden.


Lupin’s particular personal situation had rebuilt a good share of the credibility that the department had lost over the years among the magical creatures. Being a magical creature himself made him an excellent diplomat and made his empathy for their grievances genuine. He knew all too well what it felt like to be treated as an outcast with the humans. Even though his situation was not as difficult as some and could even be managed to an extent with the right potions, it had never felt nice to be the scariest person among his acquaintances. And with good reason - even those that he cared about most were not safe around him when the moon was full.


Apparently they had begun to read some things in the stars that could no longer be disregarded or misconstrued, leading them to draw some of the same conclusions that had caused the disagreement and eventual breach with Firenze some years ago. While they as meticulous astronomers had long since noticed the shift in the celestial dance, the centaur elders had believed the impending pattern to indicate a strictly human matter and had fought with Firenze over his insistence about its overlap into other populations. Now, while in no way considering making general amends, they were approaching Firenze with the intent of gaining his counsel regarding the tide of events to determine what steps they would be willing to take.


~~**~~


Harry watched in amazement as Lupin gave him a stern ‘stay-out-of-this’ look over his shoulder and led the envoys into the grotto.


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“You did WHAT?” screeched Hermione, looking in astonishment at Ginny.


The two girls were sitting cross-legged on Hermione’s bed, and Hermione was on the side where she could keep an eye on her window. She was expecting a visit from Viktor that evening, but preferred to keep it secret that he had been coming to her room. The news that Ginny had just given her, though, put everything else out of her mind. She had known that Harry and Ginny had become an item and even knew that they had tried a bit more than kissing, but - this!


Ginny grinned and swatted a pillow at Hermione. “Oh, come on. You don’t need to look like that about it! It was really nice!”


Hermione looked wary. “But... we’re still in school - are you sure you want to be taking a step like that?”


“Well, it’s a little late for that now, though - it’s done. And I hope to do it again! I wasn’t planning on it, but you wouldn’t believe what he was doing to me with his hands, and -”


“Stop!” screamed Hermione, clapping her hands over her ears. “Oh my *God* Ginny - that is *not* a mental picture of Harry that I want to have!”


Laughing harder and blushing, Ginny covered her face. “Sorry. But anyway, yes - I was sure that I wanted to take a step like that. It’s not exactly like we rushed into it, and it’s not exactly like we’re the only Hogwarts students who are doing it, either.”


Giving a little smile in return now, Hermione said shyly, “Well, if you two are fine with it then I’ll be happy for you. I don’t imagine that Ron knows, though, does he?”


“I really hope not,” said Ginny looking worried. “I know it’s his best friend and everything, but I hope he holds off telling him for at least awhile. I mean, with you it’s different - I don’t think he would blab on me to the rest of the family or anything, but it’s not exactly the kind of information you want to share with your brother.”


“No, I guess it wouldn’t be. After all -” Hermione said, cutting off in the middle of her sentence when she saw Viktor’s face appear at the window. Quite unintentionally, she turned beet red.


Ginny turned around to see what she was looking at, saw Viktor, and then whipped her head back around to look at Hermione, her eyebrows raised. “Hermione! Have you been holding out on me?”


“No! It’s not like that at all - he visits me here so we have some privacy, but all we do is talk or read.”


Ginny scrunched up her nose. “Really? Why?”


“Goodbye, Ginny,” said Hermione, shooing her off the bed and out the door. Honestly, that girl and her ideas! Hermione went to the window to let Viktor in, and wondered if he had heard any of the conversation.


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The Order of the Phoenix gathered at Black Manor for their final meeting before the battle. They received their co-apparation markers and Dumbledore briefed them about what to expect and how to follow them when the time came. Members of the council circulated among the Order and both confirmed assignments and answered questions, and the meeting took on an air of solemnity. Though there were many more people present than they had originally begun with, dinner afterward was quiet. A mood of determination and gravity were plain on even the typically jovial faces.


Among the group around the lined-up tables were a dozen aurors from the Ministry of Magic in addition to those already belonging to the Order. Tonks had been watching and waiting for a long time to get a good feel for those who would be strong allies and who were opposed to the dismal and worrisome bureaucratic shifts that tak taken place in the ministry over the past several years. The last thing they needed was to have one of their number suddenly decide to go by the book.


Also present were most of the DA group who were astounded to be called in to use the training they had done over the years since their formation. The addition of a number of such formidable young witches and wizards was a boon to the Order, and gave some balance to the horrifically increasing numbers of the death eaters reported by Snape.

Parvati and Padma Patil in particular were lightning fast and shrewd with their moves. Lavender Brown was much better after having gotten over her squeamishness about actually using magic against someone in a fight. Those girls sat together among the cluster of DA students and, for a change, were not giggling. They did, however, stare a bit in astonishment in Professor Snape’s direction - he was the last person they would have expected to see as an ally to Dumbledore and in support of Harry.


Neville Longbottom, who had already been included in the past few meetings, had been the biggest surprise to all who had not known about his part in past confrontations with Harry and Ron. Once notorious for his blunders, he had come into his own right as a powerful wizard who was brave when he needed to be. Luna Lovegood was the only one among the group of newly included students that took the entire matter in stride, either calmly or daftly - it was still a bit hard to tell sometimes.


That night, Molly and Arthur Weasley walked through the house after everyone else had gone to bed and tucked in each of their children and kissed them on the head. Although they were all grown and it had been ages since even Ginny had been tucked in, there was an old warmth and familiarity in the act and all of them accepted it without question.


~~**~~

Once they received the countermarkers that would allow them to apparate to Voldemort through the link to Severus Snape’s Dark Mark, the members of the resistance began to wait in earnest for the battle. All of them were sensitive to the precious urgency that time attains when people remember to savor it. While they all spent the time in their own ways, and some spent it quite differently than one might have expected, everyone who returned from the war remembered with crystal clarity what they were doing when the moment finally came.


Harry Potter was staring broodingly out of the window, silently rehearsing the spells to defeat Voldemort, and silently rehearsing the flying sequences he would use. Almost, almost... The thought that still plagued him after all this time was the uncertainty of his own success. He *had* to succeed, but what if he didn’t? What then?


True, he had managed to face Voldemort in the past and had been the one to walk away from each encounter, but in the meantime, Voldemort had been regaining strength and each encounter with him had presented challenges that were exponentially more difficult than the last. He was a boy, he was a weapon, he was bloody well ready for all of this to be over. He looked down at his arm grimly as the burning began.


Megan weadieading a book on Severus’ lap, and he was absentmindedly stroking her hair and looking into the fire. As his dark mark was activated by Voldemort’s call, the burning pain spread up his arm. Megan felt him wince, and a second later, the burning began on her countermarker.


“This is it,” he said gravely.


With a dreadful numbness at the arrival of this confrontation, Megan nodded and stood up.


Severus put on his death eater’s robe and picked up his silvery mask one last time. He looked at Megan and held her at arm’s length. His heart felt too much to express, so he simply said, “You are my treasure. Be safe tonight.”


She nd, md, meeting his eyes while grabbing her pouch and slinging it around her neck. “You too.”


There would be time for sweeter exchanges later. The urgency and tension of the moment left no room for more than a hasty embrace before they sped off in separate directions.


The twisting need to follow the countermarker intensified as Megan ran to Hagrid’s hut. She pounded on the door, and he opened it immediately, having felt the beckoning of his own marker. dy?”dy?” she asked.


Hagrid nodded curtly and shut the door behind him, not bothering to latch it. Megan noticed that he had left enough food out to last Fang well over a week. They hurried silently to the main gates, where many of the other groups leaving from Hogwarts were already crackling away into nighnight toward the confrontation that would change everything.


Megan heard a sharp braying call ring through the air, and saw Firenze standing by Dumbledore and Lupin at the entrance to the Forbidden Forest. The sound was answered a moment later by a distant horn, and before long the rumbling of heavy footfalls shook the ground and approached them quickly. A group of twenty centaurs appeared with bows in their hands and quivers slung over their broad shoulders. The moonlight shone on their bare muscled torsos, and they stamped impatiently at the ground as Diogenes exchanged words with Dumbledore.


~~**~~

As Hagrid pulled the big iron gate closed behind Megan and him, he saw that Charlie and Bill were slowly and steadily leading the dragons toward the edge of the grounds, and were the last of the groups assigned to come from this location. Taking Hagrid by his enormous hands, Megan disapparated with him, letting herself follow the mark, and they both vanished with a pop.


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A/N - Hello again! Between travel and the new semester starting at school, I\'ve had a lot less time than I hoped to work on this. But here\'s 2 (count \'em 2!) new chapters for you. Glad to be back though, and it looks like things are settling down a bit now. Best wishes to all of you. :-)

Special thanks to all of you who R&R - you are great!!! Love to know what you think.

Thanks also to Maggie re: Draco consultation!

droxy - ::blushing:: - You are the best ego tonic ever! Thank you so much for your sweet comments - what a delight to me that you enjoy the story.


deblovesdragon - Hey there! :-) Great to hear from you again & thx for your comments. Don\'t worry - I promise right now that I will never give unplanned babies to the students. I\'m just working on the assumption that they take care \'o that stuff on their own to make sure it doesn\'t happen. Yeah, Charlie really has to say what no one else does, lol! Sorry if she\'s a weenie sometimes, I promise I\'m going somewhere with it. Have included a little more insight in this chap. than I was planning to for now, but it seemed like a good time to put it in. But thanks for keeping up with the story and your awesome words of encouragement!!!


Ann - Thanks! :-)


Nimue - Wow, thank you so much! I don\'t even know where to begin, except to thank you for your insight and comments!! I appreciate them more than you can know. Harry Potter was something that I sort of fell into - have only read the books once each myself, but found the characters malleable enough and the story as it currently stands open-ended enough to be able to play around with it. I hated Snape at first, but as I kept reading, he caught my attention as someone wholly nasty, yes, but also that way for a reason and wholly misunderstood. JKR\'s canon for these stories has some basics, but also seems to be flexible - in fact, without digging too deeply, one can pretty easily find places where she contradicts herself with it. (Which makes it a bit easier to do original stuff within said canon!) So anyway, I love that you are enjoying the story for its own sake even if you don\'t know the books inside out. Thank you also for your wonderful insight about the storyline & main character. I promise that I\'m going somewhere (but kinda slower than I had originally planned!) with her perfection. You\'re absolutely right - it\'s not normal to have those kinds of reactions to things - I think I haven\'t made it as clear in print as it is in my head, but have - in this chap - tried to give some more insight. Tough for a character who is not insightful, an overachiever, and avoidant of feelings, but I gave it a shot. Best wishes to you, & I\'d love to hear back if you have any other thoughts. Oh - BTW - I bow to your love for the LOTR stories and for your most excellent taste in Legolas.