Ember. It means fire. Ember was never safe. Even before she was born she was coverted. Hunted. She's the last of her kind. Once there were many. Once there were four. Four families. One for each element. Air. Water. Earth. Fire. Every other family e...
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Hermione ploughed her way back to Hagrid's cabin through two feet of snow on Sunday morning. Ember was going to go with her but she seemed so much more fragile these days. She nearly fell down the stairs that morning when a sudden coughing fit hit her. Luckily Alicia had been right behind her and stopped her from falling. But Ember was coughing for five minutes straight and was gasping for breath.
"That's it. There's no way you can go anywhere." Harry said as he and Ron helped Ember into an armchair by the fire.
She was cold to touch.
Ember leaned back into the arm chair and closed her eyes. The shadows under her eyes were more pronounced, her cheeks more hollow. Her skin deathly pale. Nymeria sat on Ember's lap, blinking at her in concern.
"Even Nymeria's worried." Hermione whispered in concern.
"That potion is slowly draining the life out of her." Ron hissed angrily, keeping his voice down as Ember had fallen asleep in the armchair.
"Look you two stay here with her, you have to do your homework anyway. I'll go try talk some sense into Hagrid. If it gets any worse take her to the hospital wing." Hermione said and hurried off.
Harry and Ron could barely focus on their homework as they constantly kept glancing at Ember, squirming uncomfortably in her sleep and they were trying to ignore the gleeful shouts drifting up from the grounds outside, where students were enjoying themselves skating on the frozen lake, tobogganing and, worst of all, bewitching snowballs to zoom up to Gryffindor Tower and rap hard on the windows.
"Oi!" bellowed Ron, finally losing patience and sticking his head out of the window. Harry's head whipped towards Ember, who stirred but remained asleep. "I am a prefect and if one more snowball hits this window - OUCH!"
He withdrew his head sharply, his face covered in snow.
"It's Fred and George,'' he said bitterly, slamming the window behind him. "Gits . . ."
Hermione returned from Hagrid's just before lunch, shivering slightly, her robes damp to the knees.
"So?" said Ron, looking up when she entered. "Got all his lessons planned for him?'
"Well, I tried," she said dully, sinking into a chair beside Harry. She pulled out her wand and gave it a complicated little wave so that hot air streamed out of the tip; she then pointed this at her robes, which began to steam as they dried out. "He wasn't even there when I arrived, I was knocking for at least half an hour. And then he came stumping out of the Forest -"
Harry groaned.
The Forbidden Forest was teeming with the kind of creatures most likely to get Hagrid the sack.
"What's he keeping in there? Did he say?" Harry asked.
"No,'' said Hermione miserably. "He says he wants them to be a surprise. I tried to explain about Umbridge, but he just doesn't get it. He kept saying nobody in their right mind would rather study Knarls than Chimaeras - oh, I don't think he's got a Chimaera," she added at the appalled look on Harry and Ron's faces, "but that's not for lack of trying, from what he said about how hard it is to get eggs. I don't know how many times I told him he'd be better off following Grubbly - Plank's plan, I honestly don't think he listened to half of what I said. He's in a bit of a funny mood, you know. He still won't say how he got all those injuries."
