“May I inquire…”

“No, you may not.”

“Miss O’Feir…”

“No, professor.”

“Niamh,” growled Severus under his breath, stopping and turning towards the girl.  She had her face turned to the floor, her chin tucked against her chest.  “Child, look at me.”

The dark head did not move and Severus sighed.

“Niamh,” he said softly, “look at me.”

The head lifted and wide blue eyes looked into his.  Severus smiled and patted her shoulder, tucking her wand into her pocket as he did so.

“Now,” he said, “one wonders why you claim that boy is dead.”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” mumbled Niamh, looking away.

Severus grasped the girl’s chin and turned her face back towards him.  He looked at her for a long moment then said, “You will have to eventually.”

“I know, sir.  Is that all?”

Severus sighed and nodded.  Niamh nodded slightly, a barely perceptible nod, and started to walk away.

“Miss O’Feir.”

Niamh stopped and turned to look at Severus, who had his usual bitter expression on his face.  But his eyes were not yet hooded and she could see concern for her in them.  The same concern he has for Harry, she thought idly.

“Sir?”

“You know where my office is, should you change your mind.”

Niamh blinked then saw a pair of Hufflepuff third years coming down the corridor behind him.  She nodded, a small smile on her face as she realized Severus was offering her the solitude of his office and his company if she ever needed it.  With a dawning expression on her face, she murmured, “Thank you, sir,” before turning and heading towards Arx Serpens.

Behind her, Severus shook his head slightly then snapped at the two Hufflepuff’s, who were inching away from him.  They broke into a run when he snapped at them.  Severus took pleasure in taking five points from their House for running in the halls.

/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/*/

Halfway to Arx Serpens, Niamh stopped in her tracks.  She stood there for a few moments before she turned around and headed in the general direction of the hospital wing.

Once there, she pushed the curtains back from around Harry’s bed and paused, staring blankly at the unconscious form of her friend.  Quite suddenly a whole flood of feelings came pouring up from the depths of her soul and she pulled back.  As the curtains fell back, she wrapped her arms about her waist, a sob threatening to wind its way up her throat.  She swallowed hard, slowly sinking to the floor as tears welled in her eyes.

Oh Lord help me, she whispered.  Harry…oh gods, Harry, why did this have to happen?  I’m a wreck.  First Cedric, now you.  Your not – gone – but I can’t reach you.  The tears streamed down her cheeks.  I can’t reach you.  It hurts.  Slytherin, it hurts…  Someone help me.  Please…

But no one came to answer her plea.  She was left to sob on the floor of the hospital wing, everything from the past year welling up.  Cedric’s death, the discovery of her ‘gifts’, her father’s beatings, Tyls’ return, Harry’s coma…too much for a fifteen-year-old to handle.

As her sobs subsided, Niamh sank into unconsciousness.  Severus found her a few hours later in that condition when he slunk up to the hospital wing to visit his son.

“Niamh?” he whispered, a worried frown crossing his features as he knelt by the young girl.  He ran his thumb over a shimmering on her cheeks and came away with the remains of the girl’s tears.  “Oh child…”

Gently, he gathered the limp form into his arms, shifting his burden slightly when she whimpered.  He felt a small hand curl about a fistful of his robes as the girl leaned into his arms.  A small smile graced his lips at this.

He looked once at the curtains that hid the still form of his son and turned away as his own grief threatened to overwhelm him.  With Harry lying comatose, he felt like he was losing him.  Like he was losing Lily all over again.

Get yourself together, Sev, he scolded himself, pushing his grief back.  Harry is going to be fine.  Niamh…perhaps a different story.

Severus sighed and whispered an apology to the still form behind the curtained area then left the hospital wing.  No one saw him as he carried Niamh down to his rooms.  There he went into the rooms his son occupied when they stayed at Hogwarts.  Ever so gently, he laid the teen down on the bed, tucking the blankets in about her.  As he straightened and looked down at the sleeping girl, he realized how much she had become like his own daughter.

Brushing locks of dark hair away from the closed eyes, he smiled slightly then left, gently closing the door behind him.  He leaned against the heavy oak wood as it clicked closed, running his hands over his face.  With the sudden realization of the fatherly feelings he felt for Niamh, his love for his son welled up, bright and painful.  It felt like a sword had been thrust through his gut.

Forcing himself away from the door, Severus retreated to his bedchamber, where he found Jardin perched on the headboard.

“Good eve,” he said to the bird wearily, the love for his son thrumming painfully at the sight of the creature.  One that had found him on the morning of Christmas.

< You visited? > asked the raven wearily.  Since Harry had fallen into his coma, the large bird had gone from a very well looking creature to a dilapidated one.  His sleek, dark feathers had lost their shine and sometimes fell out.  The bright yellow eyes had dimmed to bronze, pain flashing in their depths constantly.  Until Harry returned, the bird would not be the same.  And probably not after that either.

“Started to,” replied Severus as he pulled off his outer robe.  “I became…otherwise occupied.”

< How so? >

“Niamh.”

Pained bronze eyes lifted to meet his black.  < The youngling?  What has she to do with your visit? >

“I found her there.  Cried herself to sleep.”

< She feels too much. >

“If you mean Diggory…”

< That is not what I mean, Severus, > snapped the bird, a sound that the Potions Master smiled at.  It had been so long since he’d heard the creature snap…

“Then pray tell me what you do mean.”

< She is an empath.  And a telepath. >

“Hence the reason she can hear you all of the time,” mused Severus, nodding.  “I see…”

< Except when…when she’s being blocked.  Then she can sense it.  I believe that she is a Seer as well. >

“Don’t suggest that to her!”

< Afraid of another Sybil? >

“Have you ever been trapped with that woman in a broom cupboard?”

< I’ve not had the pleasure.  And what were you doing with Sybil Trelawney in a broom cupboard? >

“Potter and Black thought it’d be funny to shove the two of us into it in our fifth year – she was a seventh year.  Merlin’s beard, I thought she’d never shut up.”

< Why didn’t you open the door? >

“Because they locked it, featherbrain,” growled Severus, opening his wardrobe.  He reached up to the shelf above where his robes hung and pulled down a somewhat dusty bottle.  Walking over to the table near the door, he opened a door and fumbled about until he dug up a tumbler.

< Whiskey at this time of day? >

“It is almost midnight for your information and this is not whiskey.”

Jardin batted an eye.  < Then what is it? >

“Rum,” replied Severus as he picked up the tumbler and knocked the liquid in it back.  “Oh Christ…”

< Bad? >

“Excellent.”

< You humans and your alcohol. >

“Very good alcohol.”

< Does Harry know you drink? >

“I am not some drunken slob, if that’s what you’re saying.”

< Only drunken slobs drink rum, Severus. >

“Pardon me for being raised by a drunk slob then.”

< Your father? >

“Merlin, no.  The orphanage witch.”

< A drunken slob? >

“The worst,” said Severus as he abandoned the tumbler and took a swig of the rum straight from the bottle.

< You’ll have hangover if you keep going like that. >

“Hence the reason that Hangover Draughts were invented, my dear bird.  Why don’t you go keep watch over Niamh?”

< And what are you going to do? > asked Jardin, flipping a wing.

“I am going to get very, very drunk.”

Jardin rolled his eyes and grumbled, < Humans. >

“Birds.”

< I am not a bird. >

“Let’s see: wings, tail, talons, beak, feathers, eyes.  Bird.”

< Drunken biped. >

“If that’s all the insults you can think of, then get out!”

< I can do much better.  I’m being lenient. >

“LENIENT?”

< Your drunk. >

Severus sneered and snarled, his words vaguely slurred, “Jus’ because I’m drunk does’n mean I can’t insul’ you.”

< Sure it doesn’t, > remarked Jardin disbelievingly.  < Until morning, Severus. >

“Heng,” growled Severus, sneering at the bird as he lifted the brown bottle to his lips again.

Jardin shook his head then launched himself off the headboard, flying straight through the wall to the room where Niamh lay sleeping peacefully.  Severus shook his head after the bird then went to hunt down a book to take his mind off of things at hand.