Water-horse (Snape fan fiction)

Unhealed Wounds

Ch.7 — Unhealed Wounds

The worst of it had always been that Catriona should have known — must have known — what she was doing. She had been at Hogwarts three years already that summer; she was no longer a child but a young lady, with her hair up and her skirts down, and a new-found distaste for freckled cheeks and scratched arms that had never seemed to worry her before.

But for all her reluctance to join in their old romps, Riona was still the best companion her little sister had ever had. She could skip pebbles across the burn with two — three — four bounces. She could tell the most blood-curdling stories of ghosties at bed-time you ever heard, until Minerva was curled up in such pleasurable terror she would squeak if so much as a spider brushed her. She could stitch a whole miniature trousseau for Minerva's beloved, battered china-doll Jane, and set in ruffles along each hem with tiny doll-stitches more delicate than anything old Morag could manage, even for Mother's own clothes. She could play at Snap and Tell-Me and spillikins in the schoolroom, and then chess and even bridge downstairs with Uncle Jamie and the others in the evenings; when little girls were put to bed, and scolded by Morag when she caught them peeping through the bannisters.

Uncle Jamie was perhaps both the girls' favourite guest. Tall and bony, with bright blue eyes and sandy whiskers, he was Mother's youngest brother and still unmarried; he'd spent years out in Rhodesia, and could spin the most hair-raising yarns of cursed diamonds and Apparating elephants, but that summer he'd come back to stay with friends over at the big house by the loch, and came over to see Mother and the girls almost every day.

The picnic had been Uncle Jamie's idea. The moor had been Mother's. The walk along the burn, when the hamper was empty and the grown-ups were dozing in the shade, had been Minerva's own idea, and she'd tugged and pulled at Riona to come, until Uncle Jamie had opened an eye and told Catriona for pity's sake to take the child away, before their ears all expired of exhaustion. But he'd said it in that special joky way he had, and winked at Minerva when Mother couldn't see.

It had been very hot, though. They'd taken off their boots to paddle among the stones, and then gone on again, with the dry grass prickling Minerva's feet, and a persistent fly buzzing round her nose. She tried to huff it away, but it wouldn't go. Riona told her if she didn't look out she'd end up stuck with both eyes squinting at the end of her nose, so Minerva stuck out her tongue and ran ahead. And when she'd looked back, the horse had been there.

Not a big horse — not then. Just a sturdy little black beast that might have come from any crofter's barn, and the only thing odd about it was that it hadn't been there before. Minerva had been too little to know any better. But Catriona — Catriona had spent three years in Defence Against the Dark Arts. She must have known….

The horse lowered its head and snuffled against her pockets, like old Donald in the stables at home, and Riona laughed and rubbed its nose. "Sorry, old girl, no sugar today. Where did you learn that trick, then? I'll bet someone's out looking for you — daft old thing, you'll have them all worried."

"Mother says you shouldn't talk to strange horses — or dogs," Minerva said, standing on one foot and rubbing the other against her knee, where she'd got a thorn in it. Riona was carrying their boots; but she wasn't quite sure about going that close to a strange horse.

"Mother says little girls shouldn't stick their tongues out," Riona retorted, putting one arm across the horse's back and stroking its smooth black neck. The animal snorted and nudged her, ears pricked, and she leaned against it, rubbing her cheek in its mane.

"Anyway, this horse isn't going to bite me — are you, my lass?" She swung herself onto its back as nimbly as a boy. "She's just looking for someone to take her home…."