It's OK To Not Be Ok...Right?

34. Hear You Me

When Sloane came to, she was surprised to find that she was in the hospital wing. She was a little groggy, but she managed to push herself up into a seated position. "You're awake," came a voice from the bed next to her.

She turned to see Draco with his arm held out as Madame Pomfrey stood in front of him, bandaging his arm. "Oh Miss Sage," Madame Pomfrey smiled. "I am glad you are awake. How are you feeling?"

"Like I have been attacked," Sloane shrugged. 

"Well, that is because you have," Sloane looked to the bottom of her bed. There, between her and Draco, stood Blaise, Harry, Hermione, Luna, Ginny, and Ron. It was Ron who spoke to her. 

"Oh, that explains it," Sloane smirked. "Where is Goose?"

"I left him in our dorm. I gave him some new books. I charmed them to his size and gave him some food." Hermione smiled. 

"Thank you." Sloane knew she was safe, she could see her friends and she knew she was in the hospital wing, but for some reason when she closed her eyes, even to blink, she felt like she was back in that room with that...thing. 

"Sloane?" Hermione asked, sitting on the edge of the bed. Sloane looked up to meet her eyes. "Are you OK?"

"Not even a little bit," she sighed. "How did you find me?"

"That's exactly what I would like to know." Sloane looked up to see her uncle Kingsley standing in the doorway of the hospital wing, with six, Aurors, she could tell by the uniform and Professor McGonagall who looked like a mixture of relief and anger. Hermione's face paled. She stood up. Kingsley walked to the edge of Sloane's bed and leaned in to kiss her head. "I am glad you are safe," he smiled. 

"What happened?" One of the Aurors asked. He was standing with a clipboard and a quill in his hands. 

Everyone looked to Sloane to hear what she had to say. "Well," she said, sitting up further in bed, sucking in breath at the pain she felt. "We were down in an abandoned part of the castle. Mr Filch said we were looking for tables and chairs for classrooms as quite a few had been destroyed in the fire in the Room of Requirement. My detention -"

"You got detention?" Kingsley asked, looking annoyed. 

Sloane nodded. "I did. I will explain later. So my detention was to retrieve the tables and chairs and to bring them up to be cleaned and used." Everyone nodded along as she spoke. "There were quite a few doors, seven, I think, and we checked them all, but they were empty besides one. I couldn't see anything in the room. It was blacker than black. I used my wand to create an orb, which I lit to see where I was going."

"Clever," one of the Aurors commented. 

"I thought so," Sloane smirked. 

"Glad to see your sarcasm was not affected." Kingsley chuckled. She stuck her tongue out at him.

"So what happened next?" The same Auror asked.

"I am not entirely sure. I levitated the first few tables out of the room, and then I bent down to check that the chairs were not caught on anything. That was when Mr. Filch screamed and scared the crap out of me. Then, there was a gust of wind, and the door slammed shut." Sloane was shivering beyond control as she relived what happened. She could remember exactly how she felt. She told everyone how she could literally feel the hairs on her arm and the back of her neck stand on end. How she felt so cold, she was convinced she would get frostbite. "Then I could feel someone behind me. Someone tall, making this strange noise as if talking. At first, it was just a hand on my shoulder. A hand that felt like ice. It turned me around and tried to shove me out the door. But...." She took a deep breath. "Then there was more of the same noise. This sounded angry. Very angry. And I was grabbed on my other side. I could feel nails digging into my skin." She gripped the bedsheets. "I could feel my skin slice open, and that thing peeled my skin back like I was a bloody banana."