Certain Dark Things || Book Three

xxvii. consequences

"—arriet?"

"I don't think she's awake yet."

"She should be. Madam Pomfrey said she'd be up by now—."

"Wait, her eyes are moving—."

The voices surrounding Harriet quieted, and she groaned, words flopping about in her brain like slippery, beached fish. She felt bitterly cold and wanted nothing more than to sink back into the comforting warmth of darkness—but a hand tightened around her sore fingers, and she pried her unwilling eyes open.

She wasn't in her dorm. Why wasn't she in the dorm?

"Harriet?"

"Wha' happened?" Groggy, she searched for her eyeglasses—and recognized the end table by the bed with another heartfelt groan. Elara placed her glasses on her face. "The hospital wing? Why am I here?"

"Are you all right? Do you remember the game?"

It came back to Harriet in pieces, the memory of her hands burning from the frigid wind, the lashing rain—and the Dementors. She shivered anew and clutched the blankets closer as she sat up.

"Did I—fall? What—? Who won?"

Four people stood around her bed—Elara, Hermione, Luna, and Ginny, the latter of whom still wore her muddy Quidditch gear. Harriet needed only to take one look at her uncomfortable expression to understand.

"Oh," she breathed.

"I didn't see that you'd fallen," Ginny rushed to explain, blushing. "I caught the Snitch, but you were already on the ground. I tried to argue—but Hooch said it was a valid play, and...."

Disappointment bristled in Harriet's chest. She'd never lost a game, had never failed to catch the Snitch before—let alone taken a fall from her bloody broom! How had she survived?! "Well," she said, clearing her throat. "Good game, yeah? You saw the Snitch before I did!"

Ginny smiled, but she still looked dissatisfied, and Harriet hated that her first game had been such rubbish. "I don't really remember what happened after the Dementor—erm—pushed me off the broom." She hedged the truth, not wanting to tell them what she'd heard or that she'd passed out long before hitting the ground. "What was it doing there? Is anyone else hurt?"

"No, just you." Hermione fidgeted, her hand still around Harriet's. "They weren't supposed to be on the grounds. The Aurors who are meant to be handling them by the gates said they must have sensed Sirius Black was nearby, but that's ridiculous! Professor Dumbledore was furious! He used a Patronus Charm and drove all the Dementors from the field."

Harriet furrowed her brow. A Patronus Charm? She made to throw off the sheets and get to her feet when a sudden sharp pain in her leg made her gasp. Madam Pomfrey materialized at the sound, a ferocious scowl on her face.

"Not a foot off that bed, Miss Potter!" she ordered. "And Miss Granger! I thought I told you to notify me at once when Miss Potter woke?"

"Erm, I'm sorry, ma'am."

Madam Pomfrey shoved a thick, porcelain mug into Harriet's hands, and she almost dropped it, the weight unexpected. A gritty, tar-like substance filled it to the brim and smoked under her nose. "What's this?"

"Drink it all, Potter. And don't move about! You've broken your leg and haven't the energy for me to heal it yet."

Harriet gave the mug a few tentative sniffs before taking a sip. It was chocolate—but not the kind of chocolate one could get from a sweetshop or the Express' trolley; this chocolate was heavy, bitter, and not the slightest bit sweet. Harriet coughed at the chalky texture, and her eyes streamed against the heat. "Bleurgh!"