The seer

I sat on my couch with a glass of piping hot glühwein. I was pondering everything that had went down within the last few months. Everything I had before moving here seemed to fade away slowly and I was becoming a whole new person. A person, who I felt comfortable with.

I had managed to build a home in a short period of time after overcoming the initial cultural shock. I had a few friends, places I liked and an occupation. I didn’t feel hopeless anymore like I had felt prior to moving here.

The cracking of the fireplace brought me out of my thoughts. I breathed out and put my tsaikka glass on the table and got up. The fire needed tending to. I kneeled in front of my cozy fireplace and searched for the poker, which was leaning against the hearth.

With the metal poker I moved the logs around in the hearth and deemed that I needed to get some more wood. The fire was starting to die down and the house was still quite cold. I sniffled and rose to my feet and left the poker by the fireplace.

I walked off the terrace and stepped on the frosty ground. I had thought a cloak would not be important as I would just pop into my storage and back. It was cold but not cold enough for snow to stick. November was one of my favorite times of the year. I enjoyed seeing the world slow down for winter and I loved spending time cozied up by the fireplace.

The frozen grass crunched under my feet when I walked to the shed next to my house. The door opened with whining hinges and I saw the destroyed cauldron, messy woodwork and many glass jars on the shelves. I stepped in and walked to the opposite side of the small building and started gathering wood from the pile I had gotten earlier this autumn.

Log after log I piled onto a small carrier situated near the stack of wood. I was sure the stores would last me over Christmas but after that I probably needed to get more wood. Lucky for me, the winter in here wasn’t supposed to be so cold that I needed to seal the windows or use constant warming charms in the house.

I reached over in the dim lit space and picked up a fallen birch log. A stinging pain went through my hand and I cursed.

“Saatana”, I hissed and brought my hand back. A stick was poking out of the flesh of my palm. I grimaced and pulled it out swiftly. I expected the pain to be fleeting but when I tossed the stick down, I felt nothing.

I shook my head as my ears started ringing. Oh no, not this again. I leaned onto the wooden wall and tried to steady myself from the blurring picture of reality and calm my mind. I had visions like this happen before. It was nothing new to me but I still didn’t especially like it when it happened.

My eyes rolled back and a breath escaped out. I wasn’t able to think properly anymore, I was only viewing from the side, unable to do anything.

I recognized the Department of Mysteries from the dark tiles lining the corridor. A moving light reflected off the walls. A light from a wizard’s wand. I could do nothing but to follow the reflection of the wizard. Of the wizards. There were two of them. The view was hazy and I couldn’t make out who they were.

I heard the door to the Hall of Prophecy open and I was whisked inside with the two intruders. I followed their figures through the reflections on various crystal balls lining the shelves. A buzzing of a spell hung heavy in the air and I tasted the dark magic around them. A curse strong enough to do destruction to anyone.

The figures stopped near a shelf in the middle. I heard hissing commands given. “Take it, Bode. You will get rewarded.”

The smaller one from the figures, Bode, was flailing his arms around in an attempt to stop what was about to happen. I heard wheezing breaths coming from him and but could do nothing to help him. A slap echoed in the halls.

The voice got stronger, “Stop fighting you disgusting maggot! Take the prophecy!”

A cold dread filled my every sense. No, no, don’t touch them! Whatever you do, don’t touch them! Bode! But even with all the panic and adrenaline in my veins, all I could do was to observe. To observe as the light went higher.

“Imperio!”

Bode started shaking and screaming. From the hazy reflected view I had, I could see how well resisted under the painful curse put on him. His both hands were reaching for a ball, all of his fingers flexed. He was screaming and doing everything in his power trying to fight the curse. The curse, which eventually forced his hand on the surface of the crystal ball.

Screeching alarms filled the room.

Bode was not screaming anymore.

A figure of a teapot filled my vision.

Bode was not here anymore.

I came back to reality with a cold shock. My body was crumpled in the corner and my head laid against the logs. My breathing was ragged and everything was spinning. It had not been a prophecy, it had just happened. I didn’t even have time to cry before a wave of nausea came over me and I scrambled off the floor and fell on to my knees outside of the shed and threw up all the mulled wine I just drank.

Tears mixed with wine as I crouched there until everything started to feel steady again. Bode, Bode, my mind chanted. My elder co-worker and a dear instructor was not here anymore. The image of him was twisted in my head and I knew most of him was now gone. He would never be the same again. Re-living the images made me heave again onto the red grass.

I crawled on my hands and knees away from the vomit and laid on my back. Tears were streaming down. They felt thick and burned my freezing cheeks. Sobs racked everything in me and I cried like a little child. I couldn’t stand up, no, the vision had taken everything in me.

My eyes searched the night sky for a vision, a miracle. A miracle that somehow Bode was still in his right mind. But no vision came and the stars seemed to be laughing in its place. How could they exist so beautifully when something this terrible had just happened?

I rolled over to my side and couched. My teeth were clattering together. I was freezing. I was just barely aware that I started to be in danger from the cold. At least I still could feel the freezing pain in my limbs.

I needed to move. I searched for my wand and pulled it stiffly out from my thigh pocket. I needed someone to know what had happened.

“Expecto Patronum”, I murmured. My voice was hoarse from the crying. Nothing came out. I cursed. I thought of my family. “Expecto patronum”, I whispered and a thin whisp of light came out of my wand. The shock had taken my ability to conjure a fully corporeal patronus.

“Get Severus. Tell him Broderick Bode is hovering near death in the prophecy room. He needs to inform someone”, I said. “And tell him to send someone here now.”

With that the light flew out of my sight and vanished into the forest. I laid my head on the cold grass. I needed to move badly but none of my limbs were listening. I tapped a finger onto my wand in attempt to cast a warming charm but nothing worked.

I did it again but I only ended up losing the last of my powers. Nothing worked.

I laid on the solid ground and let tears stream slowly down my cheeks. The supply was getting dry and my face felt awfully numb. I couldn’t feel my lips, toes or fingers anymore. My brain was slowly beginning to calm me and I was starting to feel at peace. Lucky my body was still shivering badly so I knew I still had time before I would be in mortal danger.

I laid there for a moment which felt like an eternity. Maybe my consciousness started slipping when I couldn’t tell how much time passed. Maybe it was minutes or maybe it was hours. Eventually my eyes shut and I laid peacefully on the grass.

A crack woke me up. I could barely understand what had happened before Severus appeared beside me. He was kneeling by me with a serious look on his face. My eyes fluttered in the cold and I forced myself to look at him. I tried to speak but my jaw was shaking so badly that I couldn’t. I huffed when Severus felt my forehead with his hand.

He cursed under his breath and pulled his hand away. “Idiotic girl”, he mumbled and took off his robe. He covered me with it before picking my body up in his arms.

I couldn’t say anything to him in response even when I wanted to. I could only lie there limply in his arms and shiver against the heat radiating from him. He walked with swift steps to my house and closed the door behind him with a swish of his finger.

I groaned when he laid me on my beloved leather sofa. The heat in the apartment hurt my cold skin and my stiff limbs protested against Severus lowering me on to the couch. He swiped a lock of wet hair from my face and muttered warming and drying charms under his breath.

I started to feel tingling in my toes and fingers from the charms and shivered again. His eyes searched the room and found a blanket near the fireplace. I had been wrapped up in it earlier today when I lit the fire. Severus stretched his hand near it and the quilt flew to his palm.

“Why would you go out without proper clothes?” he reprimanded me while covering me with the warm blanket.

My fingers started twitching again under the blanket and I managed to swallow. Severus shook his head and stood up. “Not enough”, he muttered and left the room. The cramping in my muscles was slowly starting to ease and I tried to breathe normally.

A heavy cover was laid over me and I sighed when the warmth began to build under all the fabric. I grasped my sleeping blanket, which he had retrieved from the bedroom, and snuggled deeper under it, the quilt and his robe.

I started to dose off and didn’t notice Severus making his way to the kitchen. He found my kettle and laid a side eye at the remnants of the glühwein in it before pouring it down the sink and filling the pot with clean water instead.

Then he went through my cabinets and found the spice and ingredients -section and cursed again. “Don’t you keep anything useful in here?”

I was roused from my deepening thoughts when Severus laid a cup of tea in front of me. “Drink it,” he ordered and sat on an armchair near me with a similar cup in his hand.

He leaned back and watched me with his sharp eyes when I slowly pulled myself into a sitting position and took the cup from the table. The liquid was hot but I managed not to burn my tongue as I sipped it. I lowered the cup and looked at him. The dying embers from the fireplace brought out warm tones in his hair and eyes. I hadn’t even noticed that he indeed had some brown in his eyes.

“Is he alive?” I broke the silence. A lump was forming in my throat again.

Clenched his jaw. “Yes”, he said. “A security team was alerted when the protection spells broke. Dumbledore found out just minutes before I sent my patronus to him.”

I looked down at my teacup. I should’ve felt relief when I heard that he was alive but instead a cold terror filled my veins. A death would’ve been a blessing opposed to the situation those protection spells caused.

“An emergency order meeting is already gathering”, Severus said.

I sipped from my cup again and tried to push away thoughts of Bode and the image of a teapot. It was not a time for me to break apart. But as much as I tried, I couldn’t keep the thoughts away. I wouldn’t be able to go to the meeting today without breaking apart from the terror and aftermath of the vision.

“You need to go in my place, Severus”, I said.

“You are why we are having this meeting, miss Koski.”

I put the cup back on the table. “Don’t you know what a vision like that does to a seer?” I pleaded. “A true window in place can leave me unable to do anything. You saw me outside. I was there because of the vision spent my magic. I couldn’t even move”

“You are completely absurd –!” he hissed.

“Go there for me. Use legilimency on me. Look at the vision and tell them what you saw in my mind!” I said in my defense. He was the most stubborn man I ever met. “You have done it before. Why not now?”

Severus straightened up. “Legilimency is not something to take lightly. I can’t just read your mind like an open book, even if I wanted to.”

I moved my legs under the blankets and crossed them slowly. “You are experienced enough to find the vision. It’s right on the top of my thoughts. It’s still sharp.”

Severus’s black eyes narrowed. He seemed to be in thought for a moment before there was a slight change in his posture. His shoulders relaxed and he seemed to let out a huff of air. “Fine”, he said.

“You must do everything I say in order for me to get the vision”, he continued. “First, try to remember every single detail from it, don’t modify anything. Keep eye contact and try not to pass out again. Understood?”

I did as he instructed.

I kept my gaze locked on his eyes and dived back into the vision. I ignored the small pressure inside my head as I started from the shed, letting my thoughts trail past getting the stick in my hand and then found my way through the dark halls in the Department of Mysteries.

I broke a cold sweat when I tried to recall all the details. It was harder to relive the vision now when my magical stamina was running low. And it was going down fast with Severus inside my head.

“Focus”, his velvety voice said.

My finger twitched and I forced myself to go back to observing Bode fighting the curse. Which he had done unusually well. I tried to remain completely objective and not let any emotions get in my way. Even when the end had happened. Even when the screaming of the alarms had rung inside my head and the damned teapot had appeared.

When Severus seemed satisfied enough, he pulled back from my mind. I had a nauseating feeling of having to re adjust into my body. My magic was all spent again and I felt the corners from my vision dimming.

“Severus”, I mumbled. The view seemed to flicker in and out. I saw recognition flashing in his eyes before he moved to catch my body.

All went blissfully dark.