Set Ablaze (Repost-idiot--me--deleted it)

Natalie stretched and sat up. Sun poured into the infirmary. It was beautiful out, though admittedly probably chilly. Finally she felt fine, energized, and ready for the battle that would come with Madam Pomfrey, but as it turned out, the nurse was so angry over the entire situation, all she said was, “Fine, I don’t see why my opinion matters,” and stalked away.

Feeling slightly bad to have caused the nurse so much grief, Natalie tried as best she could to suppress her grin. She quickly changed out of her hospital gown and into her school uniform waiting in the cabinet beside her bed. She left off the vest and tie and stockings. Whoever brought her clothes was very thorough. Deciding against saying good-bye to Madam Promfrey, she slipped down the long room and out the doors.

Not pausing on the landing, she kept going, quick-stepping her feet down the stairs and speed walking down the halls. he first thought was to go outside. She wanted to run through the grass and hear the lake, but it was too cold to go without her cloak, and she really wanted to avoid returning to her dorm. She turned her feet and started her way to the library. She missed the books.

Madam Pince surveyed her suspiciously when she walked in, heading straight to the section on magical creatures. Surrounded by tall, dusty shelves covered in dim lighting and occasionally having to duck from a flying book as it shot past her, she smiled. Her finger hooked a spine, and the book fell out and open to a general passage on vampires. It felt as if the books had missed her too. With a sign, she sat on the floor and began to read.

The shallow information could not keep her attention, however. Her mind began to wander and landed on Professor Snape. Shit, she thought. Last time she left the hospital wing, he was extremely angry. She closed her book, replaced it, and left the library at a brisk walk, hoping to find him before he discovered her missing.

Students littered the halls, so she assumed it was either meal time or after lesson, possibly before but there was a distinct lack of eye crusties and feet dragging, so she doubted it. She hopped down the dungeon stepped and padded down the hall, checking classrooms as she went. Students poured from the classroom on the right a door down from her. When the flow decreased, she slipped in.

The professor slumped over his desk, elbow resting on the hard surface, knuckles supporting his chin, marking essays. Fresh potions of mediocrity crowded his desk. She stopped and watched him, a few students left straggling around their tables. He looked tired, probably all the nights in the hospital wing with her. Normally intimidating and thunderous, he seemed diminished slightly.

She took a few steps forward, and said, “Professor?”

His quill froze, but his eyes didn’t lift from the parchment.

“What do you need, Miss Goust?” he asked lazily.

“I wanted to tell you I was out of the hospital wing so you didn’t worry I wasn’t there,” she explained.

“The headmaster has already informed me. Is there anything else?” he asked in a clipped tone.

Frowning, she glanced around. The last student dawdled out and shut the door. She approached his desk, and said, “Are you alright?”

“I am fine, I assure you. You have missed a great deal of lessons. I’m sure you have more urgent things to do than stand unnecessarily in my classroom.” He returned to marking papers in a particularly violent manor.

She blinked, unsure of how to handle him. Perhaps there was someone else around she could not see.

“You’re right,” she said eyeing him carefully, “Professor.”

Admittedly lost, she turned and left him alone. The excitement that flooded her at being released from the hospital wing was considerably diminished. Still refusing to return to the dorm, her feet took a path to the library, and even though she gathered several books and sat in the back squeezed into a small gap between two shelves, confusion took the forefront of her mind. Hopefully Madam Pince wouldn’t notice her when she locked up the library for the night.

~

Snape finally looked up at the echoing crash of the door shutting behind her. He dropped his quill and put his hands together. That had been more difficult than he imagined. Her voice was strong and her words straightforward, but he felt like he was hurting her, crushing her to tears, though he knew it was he however, who felt the pain. She had been an easy edition to his life, the sort he had never possessed before. She didn’t question him when he sat at her bedside. She hadn’t pulled from his touch, and she welcomed his company, sought it out even.

And now he was turning her away.

An old, familiar pain began to burn in his throat.

~

Potions lessons were synonymous with torcher for most students, but never before had they been so for the potions master. He did his best to mentally check out and focus solely on his work, but in Natalie’s classes he stared unblinkingly at parchment until the bell sounded and the students left. Even then, he waited several minutes in case she stayed behind to speak with him. He did much the same thing at meals. Before, he often took pleasure in pursuing the library after meals but now avoided it completely, as it was her favorite place.

Natalie spent every night since her release from the infirmary in the library. Madam Pince’s wards were irritatingly perfect, no weaknesses to exploit, so he placed a few specifically spelled stones among the shelves to nullify the inside wards. She was protected by the external wards still as long as she didn’t try to leave. Even if Snape’s abrupt brush-off caused her no anguish, she had no one and could use the space.

As Christmas approached, Severus' anxiety grew. He was suffocating. Well after midnight, he dawned his thick woolen cloak and beaver lined, dragon hide gloves. It was freezing out but surely better than being pent up. He stood outside the castle doors and drew in a breath. The air’s chill soothed the spot in his chest where pain tried to crush him from the inside out. Several deep breaths later, he proceeded out to the lake. Even in dark it was beautiful. Moonlight shimmered across the surface like glass. He stopped at the water’s edge and lowered himself to the ground. The grass was frosted, not yet crunching with ice, but was still sufficient to radiate its cold through his clothing and into his skin.

The Order wasn’t doing well, but the Dark Lord was. Severus would murder Fudge himself if he thought it would help. The Dark Lord had not contacted him in any way for over a month now. The silence put him on edge, and it didn’t mix well with the emotions plaguing him already. Everything outside the castle seemed calmer, less terrible, and with a few minutes meditation, less painful.

Soft footsteps rustled from his left towards the forest. He carefully gripped his wand and waited. Ratty sneakers slid into view, and part of him relaxed. Natalie watched him for a minute, waiting to see if he would get up, but he just sat and looked over the lake. She stepped forward and seated herself beside the professor, the ground numbing her already partially frozen skin. She wasn’t as close to him as she might have been otherwise, something he didn’t fail to notice. She pulled her knees up and wrapped her arms around them.

Severus battled himself, knowing he should yell at her for being outside the castle well past curfew and march her to her Head of House and demand a month of detention—because Dumbledore wouldn’t like this. He felt it was no longer his place to punish her, though. Student-teacher relationships were against the rules because of the teacher’s position of power over the student, but Severus Snape found the barest hint of that relationship stripped him of power over her all together.

“How are you?” she asked quietly, not looking at him.

He didn’t respond. After several controlled breath, he said, “You should not be out here.”

Turning to look at him, she asked, “What is wrong? Something is different now, and I don’t know why.”

He decided an answer was required and that he would stick as close to the truth as he could.

“The headmaster has requested I keep my distance from you. He feels the time I have spent in the infirmary and your time in my chambers alludes to an inappropriate relationship.”

“No,” she replied right away, “No, I’ll tell him—“

“He would see it as defending me, which would only escalate the problem.”

Natalie lapsed into silence. The air between them was thick. They sat fully aware of each other. He was stiff and unsure, and she slowly went into a slouch, resigned to the new situation.

“I put my only friend’s job in jeopardy,” she said.

Snape finally looked at her, taken by surprise. A tiny elation bloomed somewhere in him. She considered them friends. He had done something right.

“You need me to stay away from you,” she said sadly, “Like not sit by you on the grounds with no one around after curfew.”

“That would be preferable,” he told her coldly, looking back out to the lake.

“Yeah,” she mumbled, standing and brushing her pants and robe off. Her hands were pink from the cold, as were the patches of exposed skin through the holes in her socks and sneakers.

“I am sorry,” she told him, pulling her sleeves down over her hands as far as they would go, “I didn’t mean to cause you trouble, and I’ll miss having you around. Good-bye, Professor.”

Her feet turned and padded away back towards the forest. She wasn’t going back inside. Again he berated himself for not instructing her to get where it was warm. He supposed he could have asked her to, but he had no right to ask anything of her now. At least she didn’t hate him. His last words with Lily were desperate and angry. He couldn’t handle Natalie hating him too. Friend, that’s what she had called him, but that was before she had so sadly walked away. She might not hate him, but thinking he hated her was much worse.

“Miss Goust,” he called as he stood, completely unsure of what he was doing.

She stopped with a frown and watched him approach. He halted just before her, lifted his hands, and tugged at the tips of his gloved fingers one at a time. Once his fingers were free, he removed the glove and did the same for the other hand. Holding them out to her, his eyes focused more on her shoulder then her face. He could think of nothing to do or say Dumbledore would not be furious with to convey his lack of resentment. He needed her to know that he too was sorry.

Blinking slowly at his offering, her icy fingers reach up to take them, brushing on his warm skin. As soon as the gloves were securely in her hands, he turned and marched away.

~

A burning seared his left arm, bringing on both relief and fear. Severus stood from his kitchen table, waved his wand, and a black web that seemed to leak from the shadows wove a cloak around him. Another wave, and a silver, metal mask appeared on the table before him. He swiped it away and stuffed it into his pocket.

Living in the dungeon left him very little castle to walk through, but the nearly inaudible footsteps on the marble staircase were painfully obvious. He gave a quick glance back, and for the briefest of moments saw the solemness on the red-haired girl’s face. Hoping his face had given no expression, he firmly shut the castle door behind him.

~

Pain spasm-ed his fingers.

He should have had more information, better information. He should have created something, potion or spell, that would further the cause, but he brought nothing—that’s what was whispered to Severus through the dark.

His pain intensified, and his limbs began to twitch as well. This was alright though. No one stood around to watch him on the floor, and the cruciatus curse was preferable to most other punishments by far—less humiliating, lasting, and involved.

Finally the pain ceased, and he was told to quickly leave. Scrambling to gather his mask and whatever had loosened from his pockets, he straightened his robes and cloak, and marched out of the manor, disappearing as soon as he left the property line.

Back inside the Hogwarts gates, he paused and focused on his breathing, hands trembling as they roamed over his body, searching for injuries. Relieved when he realized his body was devoid of injuries and had not lost continence, he continued his way into the castle. The closer he got to his rooms, the more his body weighed. It was as if it knew he was closer to safety and was slowly giving away. Getting down the stairs to the dungeon was extremely difficult. His feet drug along the stone.

“Professor.”

Natalie’s voice was alarmed as she ran up in front of him. She tried to take his arm, but he pulled away.

“Please,” she asked breathlessly, her hair straying over her face, “Let me help you to your room. I will not go in with you, I swear. Please.”

“Go to bed,” he said, cursing the tremble in his voice. That damn curse frayed his nerves and took his motor skills.

She reached for him again, but he pulled away and stopped walking. This girl couldn’t come with him. He refused to put her any more danger, but he knew she wouldn’t stop. Nothing he said was going to make her leave him when she knew he was injured.

“This is ridiculous!” he spat, “I have tried to be nice to you, tried to be reasonable with your strange attachment to me, but I am your teacher, your superior, and you will listen to me. You have done enough damage to my career and patients as it is. I have no need for clingy children, now leave.”

He turned away from her, regret already clawing at his insides, but he was in too much much pain, too irritated to care at that moment. She stood frozen in shock as he disappeared behind his door, but understanding soon thawed her, and all she could do was force herself back into the main castle. She couldn’t believe she had pushed him so far. Everything he said was true of course, but she rather thought they had an understanding. Even after Dumbledore's decree, they had still maintained some--something. A semblance of friendship? This little, unspoken bond had still been there, but now she felt it snap, like the taut string of a guitar, with it a sharp, searing pain she had never known before.

~

Natalie no longer attended Potions class, neither did she participate in meals or haunt the library. Hearing of her from his colleagues in the staff room was the only way he was sure she had not left the school. Dumbledore seemed to know without being told what had happened between them. He said nothing about the girl’s sudden disappearance from Snape’s class or meals. Everything was better this way.

~

All the time spent in the shadows was soothing. Under the dark canopy of the trees even at midday, she felt secluded. Good. She couldn’t take any more people. Just attending most lessons was painful enough. The forest provided a cover that separated her from the world. The centaures knew she was there, but since she mostly stuck to the same trail and few square meters, they seemed to have decided to let her be.

Most times she was numb, but other times were worse than anything she experienced. She couldn’t breathe. Gasping was a great triumph. At first it was Snape who brought on the pain, seeing him in the halls, thinking of the words he said to her, but it wasn’t just him anymore. It was this solitude she so greatly desired. This section of the world that kept her safe, kept her separate--it was killing her. She hated people, but she needed them, even just one, like Snape, and everything would be better.

For the first time since childhood, she slid to the ground, held her arms around herself, and began to cry.

~

Staying late with McGonagall hadn’t been ideal, but it helped with Living-partial transfiguration (like transforming only the scales on a dragon so one could kill it)--the theory at least. After the meeting, she ducked into her dorm quickly to grab a new notebook and change her clothes. Fresh pants felt wonderful. Throwing on three layers of cloaks, she grabbed her bag and left. Hoping to avoid everyone, she flew down the stairs, already missing the security of the trees. Landing in the entrance hall, something caught her eye, and she stopped.

Blood, that’s what it was. She followed it, but only a few steps were needed to tell where it lead. She took off at a sprint, breath harsh not in exhaustion but in fear. Drops and smears lead, as far as she could see, all the way up to Professor Snape’s door. There wasn’t a second that phased her about not making sure he was okay. Her bare feet stung from repeatedly slapping on the stone, but only a tiny area of her brain acknowledged them. The black door was shrouded in shadow, keeping stubbornly at a distance, and then she was there, crashing into the wood, grasping at the knob, not noticing the lack of wards. It finally flung open under her hand, and she fell through, stumbling over the threshold.

Barely a second passed, but her brain took in everything with hyper detail. Dumbledore knelt on the floor, his hands and wand dripping with dark scarlet. He looked up at her in surprise, his hands paused over the crouching figure beneath him. Snape, curled up and partially conscious, had black streaks stretching over his pale skin--black as if the skin were burned and pouring blood. He convulsed and gasped, eyes open to nothing. Clothing shreds littered the living room around her feet, leaving Snape paper white between the dark streams of blood.

“Miss Goust, get out!” Dumbledore yelled at her, but she didn’t hear.

She dove to the floor in front of him. Her hands touched Snape’s shoulder, ran lightly down his side, and stopped on his jutting hip. The skin was slit to the bone. Damage of this extent would not heal by itself. Given every ounce of her body, he still might not make it, but his chances would increase greatly, and with Dumbledore there, he might actually survive.

Paying no mind to his injuries, she grabbed his wrist and shoulder and turned him to his back, forcing him out of his curled position. Placing one hand on his chest and the other lower on his abdomen, she closed her eyes and desperately searched for that ball in her chest. After a few failed plucks, she took another deep breath and forced her body to relax. Heat started, finally blossoming in her chest, radiated over her shoulders and down her arms to the skin of her hands pressed against Snape. She breathed through the searing heat and forced it into him.
The longer she forced her energy, the less focus she possessed. Her energy was running dry, nearly gone, and she could feel the black fuzz creeping around her consciousness. A pressure touched her arms. She thought vaguely she could have given more.

~

His head pounded. Snape moaned without meaning to. Cold water trickled down his tongue. He choked at first but then gulped down as much as he could, not realizing how thirsty he had been. As the blackness faded, his bedroom came into view. Dumbledore stood over him, three vials hanging from between his fingers. One after another, he dumped them down Severus’ throat.

Severus forced himself into a sitting position. Admittedly he was surprised to be alive. Those curses should have shredded him to ribbons, leaving a bloody puddle. He held his hands out and examined his forearms. The black slits were gone, and all that remained were pink lines. He gasped.

“Severus--,” Dumbledore said warningly.

Snape whipped the blanket off his legs and flew out of bed, pushing Dumbledore aside. He stumbled, light headed but kept going, slamming his palm on the door to catch himself.

“Severus, you need to stay down. You are not in shape to be up.”

Snape grabbed the knob and yanked it open. He had to find her. He couldn’t do the waiting game again, not knowing if she would wake. The living room was barely lit by the fireplace embers, but there she was--still once again, hands folded, eyes closed--lying on the couch. He stood over her a second, dread washing over him.

“No,” he groaned, sinking to his knees against the couch, “What… I don’t understand.”

“I think I do,” Dumbledore said, sitting on coffee table beside him, “She healed you--wandless magic.”

“And you let her,” Snape said accusingly.

“Listen,” the old man placed a gentle hand on Snape’s shoulder, “Please listen.”

Snape looked at him with anger, a hand protectively wrapped around the unconscious girl’s arm.

“She rushed in through the door. I told her to go, but she a wild look in her eye. She saw you on the floor and went to you, rolled you over, and put her hands on your chest and stomach and closed her eyes. After a couple minutes you started to change--less bleeding, even breathing. Eventually she sagged and wobbled, so I pulled her away. She was unconscious before I laid her down.”

“You should have stopped her the second you realized it was affecting her or before she even touched my naked body.”

Snape turned back towards her. Those green eyes that made him so weak to her were once again covered indefinitely. Her face was slack and expressionless. It was then he was the shimmer hovering over her nose and mouth. His eyes widened.

“She’s not breathing on her own,” he whispered, placing his hand just under her throat as if he could feel the difference.

“I have done everything I can to keep her alive the last couple days,” Dumbledore explained.

“Couple of days!” exclaimed Snape, “She hasn’t breathed in days? What is wrong with her?”

“As far as I can tell, her condition is just like last time, only more severe. She’s weaker, but because of her need for natural potions, everything I know of to help her would make her condition worse or kill her. Do you have any suggestions?

“I don’t even know what’s wrong,” Snape mumbled.

“I have done a good amount of research since you both passed out. Are you familiar with Starlus’ Theory?”

“Magic of senses,” Snape answered distractedly, closing his eyes and resting his head on the cushion, his hair falling against her side.

“Magic channeled through senses,” corrected Dumbledore, “Starlus thought that magic originates in all of us in the mind and could be manipulated by the body, but that magic would not be endless. I believe Natalie can use magic in such a way. I also think she approached the end of her magic while healing you, so close that her body cannot sustain itself. There is of course more to what is going on, but that is all I can gather until I speak with her.”

“And you think she knows about her magic?”

“Absolutely I do. It makes sense. That is how she gets around the castle at night without incidence, in and out of the front door. She immediately put her hands on you when she saw you so injured. I think she knows enough to educate the world.”

They were quiet for a while. Snape ran his thumb over her hand, the skin now familiar to him. He whispered, “Did she do it on purpose, use so much of her magic? Was it intentional?”

“I think there is a very good chance it was.”