Refuge
Refuge
Across the hills, my own howling echoed back to me.
I couldn’t sit by the road and listen to its mournful sound surrounding me. I had to get up, go on, even if I didn’t know where. If this time was my prison, I didn’t have to create a small cell in the middle of it to shut myself up in.
I would run. Long striding, full out, as far and fast as I could. Run til my wind gave out and I was too tired to hear the arguments in my head. Til even my relentless hunger couldn’t reach into my dreams and rouse me before I slept my fill.
If I slept long enough and deep enough, when I woke up, I might discover a different picture for the puzzle. One I could solve.
I don’t remember when the rain began. At some point I became aware that I was shaking it out of my eyes and that it was sending cold runners through my fur. It felt good, that streaming cold. Real. No dream, no lingering mental effect of Bella’s spell. I raised my head and caught raindrops on my tongue as I ran. It was refreshing on my parched and thirsty throat.
The rain came harder, filling the grassy shoulder of the road with puddles and turning the road itself to mud. Panting, I slowed to a trot, then a walk and finally a stagger as my footfalls splashed and wallowed.
Better get back to the woods, where trees could provide shelter until the storm passed. There was a grove up a hill to my left- willows, I thought. Tall and graceful, first glimmering softly with some distant gold light, then fading into flickering shadows as they swayed in the wind. Since they were at the top of a hill, there’d be no puddles forming underneath them.
The slope was steep. Above me, the trees bent in the storm, their branches streaming out, long as Merlin’s beard as the wind tugged at them. Merlin’s beard- or Albus Dumbeldore’s.
Had I seen him, standing tall and strong, wand raised, at the top of the steps in the entry to the battle-chamber, just before the blazing red of Bella’s spell dissolved the vision?
The thought of Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts when I was at school, and Harry’s Headmaster now, gave me strength, as it always had since I was eleven years old. It spoke to me of haven waiting just ahead...
There was a flash- blue, pink, silver, purple, yellow, white- all in an instant. No spell, but lightning, stealing all the colours of the earth to flood the sky with brightness. A figure shimmered in the dazzle on the hilltop, cloak whipping, long hair streaming-before the world was swallowed up in darkness again.
I was almost at the crest of the hill. Flowing willow streamers brushed my upturned face.
Thunder cracked open the clouds overhead and fresh rain cascaded down. I leaped through the driving torrents, toward the shelter under the willow branches. Beneath me, a squelching clod of earth gave way, sending me sliding backward down the slope.
I skidded on wet grass! My shelter was slipping beyond my reach, even as I snatched at an outcrop of rock, a tree stump, a snake like root- anything that would keep me from sliding all the way down to the bottom.
Nothing! I gained no hold! Scrabbled with my paws-
Paws! They had no grasp! If I had my hands I could grab, could clasp- could hold-
I felt flat pads curl into fingers as they circled the scraggy branch of a small bush. They squeezed tight, held fast and learned in an instant how to love the feel of wood. The force of my sudden stop jolted through me and I lay gasping with relief.
I hadn’t lost all that much ground! Only a few yards! The dim shapes of the willows were still above me, not far out of reach. All I had to do was pull myself to my feet and-
The roots of my handhold tore loose. Lightning flashed again and thunder exploded across the sky as something grasped my forearm. Streaming hair whipped into my eyes.
“Hold on to me!”
I had nearly expected to hear Professor Dumbeldore’s resonant tones, but the voice shouting over the wind was a woman’s. Instinctively, my free hand clawed at her billowing cloak and found solid flesh beneath.
She was still shouting. “Let go of the bush!”
My fingers uncurled their urgent grip on the branch and my hand flailed up in search of hers.
“Not so fast! Any quick move could jar more earth loose!”
Force of will slowed my movements, made them precise and deliberate as I came to my feet, panting with effort and still holding tight to her hands. She took a careful step back, then another, and another. I moved with her. The ground grew more solid beneath me, and more level. Four, five, six steps and we were at the top of the hill. Wordless, we stood through another crash of thunder, before she pulled one hand free and pushed most of the hair out of her face. “We shouldn’t be out here in this,” she said, as, tugging at my hand, she turned and picked her way through the mud and the undergrowth.
“Here’s my lantern,” she said, releasing my hand as we reached level ground. “Good. It didn’t lose its flame.”
I watched her bend and adjust the wick before straightening up and lifting the lantern by a heavy metal ring. So, that was what had touched the willows with that faint golden glimmer! In the flickering glow, we gazed at each other. She was tall and erect, perhaps a bit older than I, with a few silvery swirls in her long, dark hair. Her eyes were large and long-lashed. Their colour was lost in the dimness, but I could feel their intensity as she looked at me.
“If you follow me,” her voice was brisk. “My house isn’t far from here. I’ve got a good fire. You can warm yourself while the storm passes.”
A good fire… I’d never heard of anything so welcome. “Thanks.” I said. It came out thick and hoarse, barely a croak. Quickly I nodded.
She returned the nod, then bent again to pick up a canvas sack. “All right, let’s go.”
“I’ll carry that,” I gestured to the sack.
“Fair enough.” She held it out to me as lightning slammed across the sky. “Let’s hurry. It’s a dreadful night to be out.”
I nodded. “I’ve been…” I reached for the sack, snatching for the breaths I’d lost somewhere down the hillside. “Traveling…”
The thing was much heavier than it looked. “Got caught out…” I went on as I watched her lift the lantern high to light our way. “On the road…”
I slung the sack over my shoulder. “But why are you…” I asked, grabbing more air before following half a step behind her. “Out on a night like this?”
“Supposedly, I was going to deliver a baby,” she said, lifting her long skirt to step over a fallen log. “It was a completely false alarm. Not the first one and I don’t think it’ll be the last. Only a very active baby and a very, very worried first-time father. But I had to check in case there was a problem. We’re not altogether sure of the date, but don’t think the poor little thing’s due for another three or four weeks yet. Anyway, I was more than halfway home when the rain began.”
“You’re a-” I almost said “Medi-wizard” but caught the word in time. “-a healer?”
Wind and thunder tangled a sound which could have been a laugh. “You might say so. Though at times like this, I think I’m likely just a fool.”
The humour in her tone made me wonder if maybe she was the kind of person, who, when it came right down to it, rather liked being out in a storm.
She paused, half turning back to me. “If you like…” she said. “You can bring that big dog of yours along, too.”
I stopped abruptly. How was I supposed to answer that? “My… dog?”
She nodded, turned her attention toward freeing her cloak from a snagging branch, then moved ahead of me through a grove of trees, still speaking half over her shoulder. “Well, yes. I saw him. A large black dog on the side of the hill back there. Right before I found you.”
Oh, yeah, she’d seen him! Kinda hard to miss that dog. I shouldn’t have been so careless about transforming- but what choice did I have then? And what explanation did I have now?
I didn’t want to lie to her. Not when she had put herself at risk to pull me to safety. But I couldn’t really tell her where that black dog was either, could I? “A big black dog, you said?”
“Don’t tell me you didn’t see him? He was absolutely huge.”
Well timed thunder tumbled a long domino run across the sky. “I didn’t see a dog like that tonight.” It drowned out the wild laughter that was rushing up my throat. Disguised it, even before it turned into a run of gasping coughs.
That was no lie. I hadn’t seen him. Not tonight. Not all day for that matter. Not since early this morning when I’d taken a long cold drink from a still pond.
She paused. I almost bumped into her. “Maybe we should look for him. It’s no fit night to be without shelter. He looked drenched to the skin.”
“I’m quite sure he was.” I said.
“And there’s room by the hearth.” She continued. “He’d probably like to warm himself.”
“I’m sure he would.” I agreed.
“But he might not come to a call if he’s been on his own out here… A lot of people aren’t very kind to strays. Maybe he’s shy of humans.”
Not when he spends most of his time as one, he isn’t!
I was careful not to say that aloud.
“So perhaps I’ll just leave the door to the tool shed open a bit and trust he’ll find shelter for the night if he wants it.”
“I’m sure he’ll find himself… A warm place…” I drew a shuddering breath. “To wait out the storm.”
“You really think so? He looked so thin and bedraggled.”
“I’m certain of it.” I said with total conviction.
She nodded almost reluctantly, then stepping ahead of me, pushed aside a last tangle of branches. Lightning showed a clearing with a small stone house at its centre.
“All right. Come on, let’s get ourselves out of the wet. My cloak’s about soaked through. And you! You’re shivering! You’re probably no drier than that poor dog.”
What words can describe how great the warmth of indoors felt after days outside? It’s one thing to love the outdoors when you choose to be there, quite another when you have no sure hope of being anyplace else.
My hostess grasped my arm and led me toward the fire. “I’ll bring you some blankets to wrap around you. If you’ll wait a few minutes, I’ll find something dry of my husband’s that you can change into. But for now, just sit in this chair right by the hearth and get the chill out of your bones while I go open the shed for that dog in case he followed us back here.”
He didn’t follow us, I thought as she thrust a blanket into my hands. Only you.
I sank into a big, stuffed chair, and, setting the bundle beside me, bent to take off my soggy shoes. It was odd, now that I was someplace I could feel warmth on my skin, that I noticed how deep inside of me the cold had seeped. Gooseflesh prickled my arms and back. My half-numb fingers fumbled over my shoelaces. I pulled the first shoe off and heard it splat onto the floor. I stared at it lying there, water oozing out to form a puddle, and found I had no energy to reach down and undo the second. Instead I hugged the wet, fire-warmed cloth of my robes and willed the heat to penetrate my skin and melt the shivers inside me.
“You mustn’t sit there like that. You’re freezing.”
It was too much work to speak. I shook my head.
I could feel the intensity of her gaze on my back, but her voice came from a long way off. “All right. Let’s just get these blankets around you and then we’ll warm you from inside with a good hot cup of soup.”
Something warm and slightly rough was settling itself on my shoulders and across my lap. Nice. There was a distant tug and a splat. My second soggy shoe was off. And she had offered me soup! The stuff dreams were made of!
“Soup’s on.” A cup pressed gently into my hands and fragrant steam tickled my face.
I opened my eyes. “Oh, wow! This looks great!”
She smiled at me, her eyes glinting a clear, bright green in the firelight while her long mahogany coloured hair swung, shining and nearly dry over her shoulders. “Here, hold this while I get you a bit of bread.”
Shaking my head at the spoon, I raised the cup in both hands and drank.
“You were hungry, weren’t you? Here, I’ll take the cup. Want a go at the bread?”
I tore at the tender crust, loving the flavor even as I realized it was too much work to force a second bite down my dry, thirsty throat. Still I hugged the bread tight in my fingers as my heavy hand dropped into my lap and I looked up at her in apology and appreciation.
“While you dozed,” she said. “I made up the settle next to the fire. You may as well get a night’s sleep. I think the thunder’s over now but the rain’s still coming down hard.”
“I can stay here tonight?”
“Yes. In fact, I insist on it.”
“My Godson….” I said, bringing one hoarse word slowly out after the other. “Was on the way to my Godson… I’ve got to-”
“Fat lot of good you’ll do him like this, half-starved, chilled to the bone and ready to fall down flat at his feet from exhaustion.”
There’s this sound every healer I’ve ever met gets in their voice. Sharp. Full of command. Not in the least unkind, but impossible to resist. Madam Pomphrey used it to great effect back at school. Hessia did too, when I was in Azkaban. Maybe all healers have it. I think it’s part of a spell. After they finish using that tone, they give you this hot glare that melts away every good argument you could think up. All you can do is look back at them without a single thing to say.
So that’s how Sirius the hot-headed, the arguer, the rebellious, wordlessly nodded and allowed himself to be grasped by the hand and led like a child to a bright golden spot by the hearth where a soft, cloud-like pillow and comforter waited. He felt his Wizarding robes slipping from his shoulders before, still silent, he dropped down onto something soft and warm, then to the sound of raindrops spattering on the window, tumbled headlong into sleep.