Caladrius

Disclaimer: JKR owns the rights to anything you recognize in this fic. I wish I did, but alas! Life is like a box of Bertie Bott's. Sometimes you get chocolate fudge, sometimes you get earwax.

PAGE 394 CHALLENGE

1. Take the nearest five thick books. If you don't have five thick books near you, go to the bookshelf. If you're too lazy to do that, use fewer than five.

1a. None of the Harry Potter books are allowed, however. Anyone doing that will have a week's detention with Snape, and it won't be that sort of detention. It will involve scrubbing cauldrons and pickling pig foetuses.

2. Turn to page 394.

3. Take the second sentence on that page of each book.

4. Arrange the sentences to form as coherent a story as possible.

5. Post your wacky tale in your LJ with these instructions.

The Books:

1. George Beahn, Muggles and Magic

- "... for the evolving human spirit" (Hah... this book has exactly 394pages – it was meant to be)

2. William Horwood, The Wolves of Time: Journeys to the Heartland

- "There was a hiss, a spatter of turf and rock dust, the phutt!, again, of a gun from the direction of the movement, and all was immediate danger once more."

3. Robert Jordan, The Eye of the World

- "Borderland fables!" the first man repeated.

4. Timothy Zahn, Specter of the Past (Actual quote from preview section by K.W. Jeter, The Bounty Hunter Wars: The Mandalorian Armor)

- "He could almost have laughed, if any twitch of his raw muscles hadn't hurt so much, pushing him toward unconscious oblivion."

5. Sylvia S. Mader, Biology (6th Edition)

- "When studies of population dynamics are done, investigators try to determine which are the key factors that determine mortality."

He had told the dotty old codger that he was no cryptozoologist. What the hell was he doing on another fool's errand for the Headmaster? He was supposed to be in retirement, enjoying the rewards of a job well done. Instead he was in this Cumbrian backwater, miles away from the tourist traps of the Lake District, arguing with the locals about something that most likely did not exist. He scowled at the two now openly hostile men in front of him. "What?"

"Borderland fables!" the first man repeated. "That be all they be!"

The man's companion nodded in agreement, his mouth set in a thin, stubborn line. Severus was sure they were lying. What he wouldn't give for the authorisation to put Veritaserum in their flagons, but the trouble he would get into would be more than the information was worth.

"Ye'd best be off, Outsider," the other man sneered, "if ye knew what be good fer ye... and the wee lass."

Scratch that – poison in their flagons would be far more satisfying. Severus' scowl deepened; threatening him was one thing, threatening his wife was something entirely different. The village inhabitants had been almost painfully friendly and welcoming to both of them, until he started asking about the bird carvings that pervaded each nook and cranny of the ancient church that dominated the village green. "I do not want to cause trouble. I merely seek information. It is an importa-"

"The 'information' be not for ye, Outsider," the first man insisted, his hand clenched into a fist on the scrubbed table. "There be nothing to find out on those hills 'cept misfortune. Heed me when I tell ye this."

Severus gritted his teeth in frustration, sorely tempted to use Legilimency to just break into their minds and extract what he had come for. It would be so devilishly easy. They were unguarded, it would only take a moment to get to the facts he needed. He cursed under his breath and broke eye contact before the temptation became too much. He couldn't draw attention to himself and, judging from the prickle of many hostile glares on his back from the other patrons, now was not the time to make a scene.

Discretion was indeed the better part of valour. "Fair enough, gentlemen. I will consider your warning. Now, if you would excuse me." He left his drink untouched on the table and nodded a curt farewell to the two men.

He left The White Crow, stalking over the old-fashioned cobbles of the market square and through the ornate, but rusty, gates that lead to the churchyard. He could see Hermione's curls bobbing in between the lichen-covered headstones around the church.

His wife was busy making rubbings of some of the grave markers, a large smudge of charcoal across her pale cheek. "I think we have outlived our welcome."

She sat back on her heels and, as if she hadn't noticed him, murmured, "Fascinating." She quickly shuffled through some of the rubbings, seeming to compare the engravings on each.

"What is fascinating?" Severus peered over her shoulder, trying to read the text.

"Well, when studies of population dynamics are done, investigators try to determine which are the key factors that determine mortality."

He both loved and hated it when she sounded like a textbook. "We are not here for a study of the human population, my dear," he offered a bit archly.

"I know, I know!" She wafted her charcoal-blackened fingers at him impatiently. "But this is so unusual for a small village at the back of beyond."

"What is?"

"All of these people died of extreme old age. No disease, no injury. Impossible for a community this old and this far from modern medical aid." Her brown eyes sparkled in excitement when she finally looked up at him. "It has to be here!"

Movement at the edge of the churchyard caught Severus' eye – several men were lurking there. Although they wore thick coats against the autumn chill, he knew by the way they carried themselves that they were concealing weapons under their outer garments. There was an unspoken menace in their stance.

"Hermione... gather your things, we need to leave now."

"But I... oh..." She had noticed them too. Hermione hastily began stuffing parchments with scrawled notes, rubbings, writing implements and her camera into her soft leather book bag. Despite the abuse she had put it through, it had somehow survived her schooldays.

Severus' fingers were tight around the polished wood of the wand in his coat pocket as they passed through a gauntlet of disgruntled villagers. Cold glares followed them to their small hired car. Severus grabbed Hermione's bag and threw it in the back while she started the engine. As soon as his door was closed, they beat a hasty retreat to their informal campsite in the woods surrounding the village, mud splattering the sides of the car as they bumped along the forest track.

***

Despite the less than fond farewell, Severus was determined to get the information they came here for. He had never been a man to give up at the first sign of resistance. If he were, he would be dead by now. Several hours later, he was pouring over a relief map of the area by the flickering light of the fire. Hermione pressed in tightly against his side, worming in under one arm before handing him his steaming mug of tea.

"Thank you," he murmured, wrapping an arm around her, but still studying the map floating obediently in front of him. "I think this is the most likely location," he said, indicating what looked like a steep valley just north of the village and taking a large appreciative sip of the warm drink. "Sufficient cover and no doubt an adequate supply of fresh water from that spring. Also easily accessible from the village... unfortunately we cannot go there. We will have to take the back way."

"The back way? Why don't I like the sound of that?" Hermione shivered against him and he vigorously rubbed his hand over her back in an attempt to generate some heat.

"It will certainly not be a pleasant hike," he replied grimly. "There seems to be dense woods and steep rocky slopes all around. We will need to get up early."

"Then I suggest," she said, flashing him a wicked smile before she gave him a languid kiss, "that we get to bed early."

"I could not agree more." Severus smirked, allowing himself to be lead to their small tent and the sleeping bag they shared, his forgotten tea slowly cooling in the night air.

***

Severus helped Hermione over the mossy log. They had been trudging through this godforsaken forest since just after dawn, but their progress had been annoyingly slow. The forest itself seemed to be intent on impeding their forward motion – trees, boulders and thorny bushes often encroaching on what was marked (rather optimistically in his opinion) as a hiking trail. Severus snorted at the map. Damn Muggles and their damn hiking trails.

If he had had his way they would be flying to the valley, but Hermione had refused to get on a broom despite all his reassurances. 'Let's take the hiking trail,' she had said. 'It will be invigorating!' she had assured him. 'Invigorating my arse!' he thought, pulling at the itchy shirt clinging to his sweaty body.

A twig snapping higher up the slope made him freeze. He grabbed Hermione, shoving her in behind him. "Hey! What do yo-"

"Shhhh," he hissed, peering up through the green murk. A silence had descended over the woods. It made the hair at the back of his neck stand on end. Their passing had only brought about a slight dampening in the noise level of the early morning chatter, but this... this was different. Ominous, almost.

He slowly reached for the wand in his pocket. As he was about to pull it out, a large stag bounded across the trail behind them, snapping twigs as it went. It stopped a short way down the slope and turned back to stare at them – its large ears swivelling toward them in interest, its nose twitching at their scent – before daintily picking its way further down the slope and out of sight.

"God... you gave me a fright there," she breathed against his shoulder.

He slowly allowed himself to come down from full alert, releasing the breath he didn't know he had been holding in a slow hiss. "My apologies. It did not feel ri-"

A flash of motion caught his eye. He forced Hermione down as a chunk of the tree they had been standing next to burst into splinters. Bloody hell! Was someone shooting at them? There was a hiss, a spatter of turf and rock dust, the phutt!, again, of a gun from the direction of the movement, and all was immediate danger once more.

"MOVE!"

Then they were running headlong along the trail, stumbling over natural obstacles, twigs tearing at their clothes and skin, rocks, trees and soil exploding at random all around them. He kept urging Hermione on, but her breath was starting to rasp in her throat and his muscles were screaming in agony.

As they slid down a small embankment, he spotted a hollow half-hidden by twining tree roots and twisting vines. There would only be room for one. "Hermione, get in there. I will lead them off."

"But-"

"Damnit, woman! For once, do as I say without questioning me! There is no time."

Hermione's jaw snapped shut and she nodded silently, her eyes glittering wetly. It only took her a few seconds to wriggle into the hiding place. "Now stay here until I return. If I do not return by nightfall... I want you to take the car and get out of here as quickly and quietly as you can."

She grabbed his hand. "I lo-"

"I know," he murmured as he cast the Disillusionment charm on her. Pushing himself to his feet, his legs somewhere between jelly and lead, he ran down the trail, making sure he was in plain sight. Sure enough, moments after his appearance, a bullet ricocheted off a boulder to his left, sharp stone slivers biting into his calf. He winced but kept going, his limp growing progressively worse as the shards worked themselves deeper into his flesh with each stride.

He swore as another volley cleanly severed a branch just by his head. Ducking down low, he dived in behind a tree and sat gasping for air, his lungs burning, the muscles in his legs twitching in protest at the abuse. He couldn't run anymore. His body would not let him. But now, with Hermione safe, he could turn and fight.

Severus grasped his wand tightly, the smooth wood comforting and warm in his hand, and waited. The rustle of feet through the fallen leaves wafted closer on the otherwise silent breeze. Severus pressed himself closer to the rough bark, fighting to control his breath, afraid that they would hear his heart pounding inside his chest. He knew he would probably only have one clear shot. The noise stopped.

Severus sat tensely, waiting for them to move again. The silence became deafening to his hypersensitive ears. Where were they? Why were they not moving? Had they turned back? He gritted his teeth and cautiously shifted his weight to peer around the tree.

The coldness of the steel that suddenly pressed against the back of his neck froze the blood in his veins. He slowly raised his hands, surreptitiously allowing his wand to slip into his sleeve.

"We told ye to leave, Outsider," a familiar voice hissed. The barrel pressed insistently on his neck, forcing him to his knees. A pair of boots appeared in his limited field of vision, their owner giving his jacket a quick pat down.

'Two of them, ' Severus thought, 'both no doubt expert shots.'

"We've had enough of yer kind. Always snooping, always prying. Ye will not just let it be." The metal pressed into his skin again. "If it be any consolation, ye got the closest of all."

Severus' face remained impassive at the man's words; he had no time to waste listening to mad ramblings, instead, he devoted his mind to finding a way out of this. He had certainly been in far worse situations while he was a spy, coming up against powerful opponents who knew a plethora of debilitating spells. He had survived those – two bumpkins with firearms were surely not an insurmountable problem.

"Where be the lass?"

Severus' hands clenched. "She is not for you."

The men laughed nastily. "Whether ye tell us, or we take care of ye and then find her, matters not to us. It will not be taken from us, it belongs here."

"But we do not want to take it! We just want to-"

The butt of the rifle cracked into his skull - stars exploded in front of his eyes, but Severus somehow remained upright. "Liar! Ye want it for yerselves! No-one would go to this much trouble if they didn't want to steal it!" the villager shrieked. Severus felt cold steel against the back of his head now, pressed harshly against the lump that was no doubt forming. "Now," the man said more calmly, "to tie up loose ends. The crows and foxes will be glad of yer bounty."

Now or never. Severus shook his wand into his hand in one fluid motion.

"Expelliarmus!" came the roared incantation, sending the man behind him flying into a sturdy tree with a wet cracking sound that made Severus cringe. The other man whirled around, but before he could level his rifle a cry of "Stupefy!" made him buckle to the ground in a senseless heap.

Severus scowled in the general direction both spells had come from. "Gods damn it, Hermione! I told you to stay put!"

"Oh shut up, you insufferable man," came her disembodied voice from close by before she embraced him tightly. He could just perceive the outline where the Disillusionment charm bent around her curves. Severus was reluctantly grateful. Hermione's acting true to her Gryffindor stereotype had saved them - the element of suprise had definitely turned the fight in their favour.

"Could you tend to your... victim?" Severus drawled, indicating the man crumpled at the base of the tree. "We do not want to alienate these villagers any more than we already have."

"What? You mean shooting at Outsiders isn't a sign of welcome around these parts?" her voice quipped, but the crackling leaves indicated her progress to the man.

"I will see to..." The other wasn't there any more. If Severus were a man given to audible expression of emotion, he would have gasped. "Hermione - stop moving." There was a cold snick as the bolt of a firearm was pulled back. Severus' blood ran cold for the umpteenth time that day. The man knew where she was.

"Ventusaevio!" A violent blast of air ripped around the small clearing, snatching all the leaves from the forest floor and forcing them into a manic, whirling dance. "Hermione – run!"

The spell had been a double-edged sword. Severus spun around, trying desperately to see his opponent. "Protego!" He wasn't sure if a shielding charm would stop a bullet, but he supposed that he would find out soon enough.

A surprised grunt escaped from Severus' lips as the man barrelled into him from behind. The momentum made them both stumble forward, pitching them head-first into some bushes.

Severus experienced a strange weightless sensation before his brain finally realized that he was tumbling head over heels down a steep slope. Time seemed to slow down, as if allowing him to inspect each rock he hit in minute detail, but not giving him the ability to do anything to avoid them. Severus was sure that he had heard several bones snap, but whether they were his or his attacker's seemed irrelevant.

He must have blacked out. When he came to, he could faintly hear Hermione screaming his name, but it seemed very distant. All he wanted to do was embrace the enveloping blackness – it was undemanding and welcoming. He was sinking into its arms again, like an old lover after a long absence, when he felt the pressure on his chest.

He frowned. The weight was keeping him from bliss. His frown deepened to a scowl as he struggled to open his eyes. There, its beak close to his face, was a bird that looked remarkably like a large crow. It was looking at him, its head turned to one side to pin him with a one-eyed stare. Its eye was pale blue and its feathers, beak and legs the purest white. It reached out to preen at a couple of stands of hair that had fallen across Severus' face.

He could almost have laughed, if any twitch of his raw muscles hadn't hurt so much, pushing him toward unconscious oblivion. It had found him. All this trouble, and here it was sitting on his chest... looking at him. Severus gasped at the implication.

He half-expected the bird to wink knowingly, but instead it spread its wings, laying them gently over his chest. Severus cried out in agony as all the pain in his body rushed towards that point. Before the pooled pain became unbearable the bird launched itself, the hurt and injury trailing from its pristine white wings like red streamers. It beat strongly into the air, leaving Severus almost breathless at the drawing sensation in his chest.

The bird rose higher and higher. When it was an almost indiscernible speck in the sky, it arched back, exposing its chest to the sun in breathtaking somersault. The trailing redness burst into flame, engulfing the bird for a moment, before dissipating into nothingness.

"Severus!" There was a small avalanche of dirt and pebbles. "Oh Merlin!"

"Hermione," he croaked. "It is here."

She had finally removed the Disillusionment charm, her concerned face eclipsing his view of the sky.

"Are you okay?"

Her voice held a fearful edge; he must look a real mess. He winced, trying to struggle upright, finding he could manage it with much less effort than he had anticipated. He took stock of himself – no broken bones, no scrapes, no bruises. That was impossible.

Another flare of light in the sky distracted them. They looked up just in time to see the last traces of the fire fading against the blue. "Damn fool birds. That be another two gone," muttered the man leaning heavily against a sapling. "I told ye to stay away!"

"I did not ask for its help," Severus countered hotly.

"Ye don' need to. The fools would cure a cold if it meant they could ride the fire. That be all they live for."

"They? Are you implying that there are more than one?" Hermione inquired.

"Not for long at the rate they be carrying on," the villager scowled darkly.

She frowned in that familiar way. "That is not what the texts suggest. They are supposed to be solitary and immortal, living at the hand of the king."

The man snorted rudely. "What will ye believe, lassie? Books or yer eyes?"

Severus could tell Hermione was working herself up into a hot retort. "Please," he interjected smoothly, placing a warning hand on her arm. "Give us the information we came for. Our sources are obviously lacking, but you have real experience of these creatures. Surely a master likes to share his knowledge?"

The man puffed up importantly. "Aye, I know all there be to know about them." Suddenly his expression was guarded again. "What makes ye think I will share knowledge with the likes of ye?"

"We come on behalf of many others who can no longer speak for themselves. Driven to madness by pain so excruciating that you could not begin to fathom it. We seek a cure, even the possibility of a cure. If you have any human compassion within you, you would give them a chance at a normal life."

The man considered this for a moment then grudgingly nodded. "Very well. I warn ye that it won't be to yer liking." He took out a pipe from his pocket, filling and lighting it with the mechanical grace that comes from countless repetitions of an action. His eyes took on a faraway look as he spoke.

"When my granda were a lad, the rookery was grand. They used to swarm these woods, riding the fire for any who came seeking aid. Too many came; there were almost none left." He took a deep draw on the stem of the pipe, the blue smoke surrounding his face like a halo when he spoke again. "Us had to protect them. A man came to our village, oh must've bin a hundred years ago if my granda's tellings were true, giving us them marker stones. The birds wouldn't pass 'em. Ye will see them all around." He indicated a nondescript moss-covered rock at the base of the slope with his pipe stem.

Severus was sure he had hit that particular one on his way down. On closer inspection, Severus could make out some fading runes carved into its mottled surface. Wizarding runes... interesting. No wonder the Headmaster had known exactly where the birds were. Damn him and his twinkling.

"When we asked him why, me granda said that he just answered - '... for the evolving human spirit'." The man shrugged. "None of us common folk understood that back then, but he were a powerful man - that sort like their riddles."

When Severus shot a glance at his wife, he could see she had reached the same conclusion. That was why the Headmaster had been so anxious for them to come here. It was one of his long-running pet projects; the barmy old badger always had a few cards concealed up his sleeve. Was it foresight or his ingrained need to meddle that made him do these things decades before they would bear fruit?

"We kept 'em secret, letting everyone think they were just stories," the man continued oblivious to the silent communication between the two Outsiders. "Soon people stopped coming, but the temptation to use the birds for usselves were too great at times. The numbers didn't wax as much as they ought to have. Now, only the right ill and the young are allowed in the valley. Old men like me waste their magic."

AN: The bird was the mythical [Caladrius]. I've changed some of the attributes to suit my needs (and to give Hermione the heebie-jeebies because the old texts weren't 'accurate'!).

The spell Severus uses ("Ventusaevio!") means "violent (saevio) wind (ventus)".

Work on other archives (for now):

[Occlumency] :: [Illusions]

This fic was beta'ed by the formidable Tevildo, who uploaded his first fic on [Lumos] - I found his take on the "Page 394 Challenge" utterly hilarious. Go check it out!