Revelations. PV Erin Ryan Detention Closed

It would not be the first time that she woke up in a hospital bed. It was not the first time she woke in agony. Her body felt heavy, and while she was no longer frozen there was a weight that lingered on her like a phantom sense. She remembered the icy chill, the crystals that encapsulated her body. She remembered the altercation that led up to it. Then there was nothing, just a deep, dark, black pit where there was nothing, not even time or awareness. 

The first indicator was a breath that was deeper than the rest, she was waking up. She could feel her chest resist the rise, like a stack of books were piled on her breast. The stretch and accompanied a groan. She opened her eyes, her gaze on the ceiling. A familiar site - a wall of white. She knew where she was. She bent her neck to the right, there was just an open space and a distant wall. Nobody was there, her only accompaniment the cramp in her neck as she turned her head the other way. She had a feeling that it would be far too much effort to sit upright, she was not wrong. She would see Professor Browne, at least she thought that was his name. 

"Good morning Miss Ryan."

"Morning," she grimaced as she craned her neck to see the window. Was it really morning already? A golden light filtered through the glass panes and filled the space with a warm, cheery brightness that contrasted the youth's demeanor.

The Hufflepuff Head of House would explain where she was. She would not nod, she knew the routine by now -- bit by bit, don't start moving too quick. Everything was still too painful and stiff. "I've waken up here before Mister Browne," Erin admitted. "Smells like bleach and sage this time," she commented. "The white is always jarring, only place where white on white is in style after the Feast of Mabon," a joke the Professor would probably not understand. 
 
"So... We are meant to spend yur detention together. However, I believe you are quite familiar with the procedures. As your detention, I'd prefer a simple conversation with you. If you would be up for that?" 

"Pff--" she let out an audible breath of air. "Your efforts would be better spent sending me to muck the stables, humiliating me in some manner before my so-called peers or finding some other consequence meant to humble me or to fear you, Sir." It was almost as if she wanted to be in trouble, like she sought it. "But whatever you want," she shrugged feeling the sinews of her shoulders stretch. She would humor the Professor, he was obviously new to this routine.

A small notebook landed on her lap, inkwell and quill nearby. She frowned at the book, a bit paranoid she gave him a look as if to ask what is that? It was likely hexed in some manner she reasoned, in fatalist style she  would force herself to sit up. Her muscles wanted to seize. For such a little girl, she had an unusual physique. Defined bare arms, striated musculature that spasmed painfully. Be it the same gown she was wearing the night before or a hospital gown it was easier to notice in the light of day, as were the scars. They were innumerable, tiny, fine silvery lines only visible from the right angle under bright light. She made no efforts to hide them, to her they were badges of honor. An expression of a moment, a wrinkle in time where there was something that shattered the monotony.

“De omnibus dubitandum,” [be suspicious of everything] she announced as she took the quill and the ink well into her hand. Her hands felt a bit numb as she tightened her grip and waited instruction.

"I'd like you to tell me about yourself. What motivates you going through with your studies here in Hogwarts. Tell me your story."

"That's it?" She waited the catch.

It did not matter, she would not believe whatever he said anyways. She bent her knees forming a tight tent with the white sheets over her knees. If he wanted some touchy feely session, thinking it would change something in her he was dead wrong. If this was some cruel trick, she might take notes.

She dipped the tip of Caradoc's quill into the black ink. 

[font=Lucida Handwriting]About me --
Erin Ryan, pureblood first born.
Second-year Hogwarts student.
Thirteen.

My motivations --
I was sent here when I turned 11, I am allowed to return home during holidays.
To learn how to cast, mix potions, procure the elements necessary for the aforementioned in an effective manner.[/font]

She was playing along of course, writing something but revealing little. Of course that was the opinion of a child, she had shared more than intended with a few simple words. There was a cold factual nature to her words, a truth she lived. Her actions suggest an action. Her words as well. It was the non-verbal elements that she lacked, those unconscious micro-mannerisms that never seemed to correlate. Her words were erroneous as well, she defined herself as basically as possible but there is validity in what she chose to write. The first statement made was about her blood, common with pure-blood children. Troubled in their own way perhaps. Secondly was her position in school and only third was her age. Her motivations were similar. She was "sent" not "admitted" or "granted entry" but sent. She chose the phrase "allowed to return" as if to suggest that she was otherwise unwelcome or only begrudgingly so. That came second to what she was actually here to do -- learn how to cast, how to mix, essentially how to be a wizard.

She would turn the page, still damp with wet ink in the direction of the Professor. "What now?"

"I never really liked hospitals." He admitted to the girl. "As a healer I liked helping my patients. Loved it even. But those dreadful white halls.. I was glad to leave them every time I clocked out." He'd smile as he fondly remembered meeting little 'Nora every night, up to something back at home. Erin went on to convince him his energy would've been better spent elsewhere. "Perhaps... perhaps not. Depends on you really. Humiliation won't be necessary." He'd nod to her general direction as he was focused on two birds chirping at each other by the window.

By now she would be finished with her first words on paper. He silently read it over and smiled. His shoulder briefly hopping up and down as he chuckled towards her writing. "Extravagant, really." he'd wink towards the girl. He could understand her reluctance opening up. He was not her friend. But that was okay. They were here to get to know each other. The way she had mentioned humiliation struck a nerve with him. In that moment he had felt sadness rather than delight. Had she been treated fairly? Then again, reputation did preceed her.

"Suspicion always haunts the guilty mind; the thief doth fear each bush an officer." The man replied to Erin's previous saying, as he picked up his own book and read further down a seemingly random page. "What are you suspicious off?" he briefly looked over to the girl in the bed. His blue eyes slightly narrowing as she seemed to catch his interest.

Caradoc was a regular Disney Princess. It was odd really, had there been someone in her life about her age that was like this she would have a very different youth. Rather her relationships were born of necessity, tradition, or with the intent of betrayal. Of course such a calm presence merely agitated Erin, she did not know how to deal with Professor Brown's demeanor. There was a universal law -- every action yields a reaction, while some might claim an equal yet opposite reaction she knew that was not true. Every biting word would be met with a cumulative wrath that would culminate in ebullient furor. 

She was compliant as she listened to every word he said. Something about being a healer in a hospital. She did not get it, the purpose of wasting your life in service to others. It was not that it was demeaning, it was just wasteful if he was a man of actual potential. What could he do that his patients could not? That the people that brought them to a medical ward could not do for them? Of course her understanding of healing was simple and she was young, durable even. She was no stranger to injuries, several deep, raw red scars interlaced with the older silvery ones told a tale she never had to. Not one of abuse, but rather violence. She sought it, like an addict seeks the needle. The ability to feel something to assure her that she was alive. "Then why didn't you take a job with better halls?" She inquired, the question had relevance because it was ad rem to the man he was.

She wrote out something completely and utterly basic, frowning when he chuckled. What was funny? 

"Suspicion always haunts the guilty mind; the thief doth fear each bush an officer."

"I did nothing wrong," Erin replied stubbornly. "Do you think I am afraid of you Professor Browne?" Her voice had a queer calm as she shook her head. "It is strange to admit that there is fear in everything but I feel none of it," she admitted. She was tense, expecting his wand to be drawn. She did not know the Hufflepuff Head of House well enough to know that would be an unlikely outcome, however she was frozen alive upon their first meeting. "I knew that there would be witnesses of my transgressions and that people would care more when I pushed over the pretty one than when I disgraced the fat one," she continued slowly as she watched him from the corner of her eye. It was a bit sick, expecting something terrible and wanting to see the moment that it happens. Defense was futile and she knew it, ruffling him likely suicide.  

"What are you suspicious off?"

As if he did not know. "I am waiting for something bad to happen," she could not be bothered to lie. "Wondering why it has not happened already with bated anticipation. Was the book cursed? The quill? Is there something else in here?" Her words thick as she ran her tongue behind her teeth. She closed the book with her hands, the ink finally dry. She swallowed. 

"I- I already know," she stammered as she handed back the book or placed it on an adjacent table. "About all of the people that disappeared. The Ravenclaw boy told me death witches but it seems odd to me that a nefarious group of people would name themselves something so obviously..." her voice trailed off. "Evil." She tried to lean forward, the vertebrae in her back would pop and snap, her muscles in her stomach would cramp and the lean tendons in her back would stretch. Was there anyone else in here?

"I know Reid Kovacs was Head Boy first year, then he disappeared. I know that it makes no sense that an eleven year old, no matter how talented, had no reason to be a Prefect let alone Head Boy. Then he disappeared. He was friendly with Ben Eckenrode, the masked boy. Gone most of the year, then saved and then he disappeared again. All of these incompetents placed in the spotlight, only to disappear weeks or months later. They come back as if they were gone for a long weekend: Howard White, Marcus DeWynter, Oliver Hart, I could go on... It's not normal and you all act like it is." She believed that the Professors and staff were keenly aware of whatever was going on and they were either active participants or they were merely complacent in the dastardly deeds being obfuscated by  the Hogwarts staff. 

He smiled and figuratively waved her comment on the halls away. He could tell her his whole career, but he had the sense it'd be a story told in vane. Her next comment involved yet another mention of intimidation. She felt as if he were challenging her. An odd point of view from a child towards a teacher. One he had to remedy over time. Show her there is another side to things. Perhaps some of the other professors had been unkind to her? Perhaps her parents were no fans of Hogwarts and had chosen to send her off with tales of how nefast the current structure had been for kids like herself. She was a pureblood after all, as she clearly wrote down on her note. He knew several pureblood families still looked down on the way Hogwarts was managed. The way they allowed mudbloods and half-beasts to learn and sometimes even teach. He chose to remain calm, and let her finish.

The young lady noted how "the pretty" were deemed more important than "the fat". Another tangent he could lean into, but for now stepped away from. A shame he had been distracted the moment her fight with Mr. Hart began. Perhaps they would have never went on to talk here, in the hospital wing. He could point out to her how human nature tended to place value on appearances and therefor their sides on the battlefields were quickly chosen. But this was neither the time nor place for such a philosophical debate. He had no clue if she was even the kind of person who would be willing to fight and stand on equality. Leave that for her later years, she is still young. He thought.

"Disappearances?"

Caradoc's voice echoed faintly through the empty wing, as she continued to draw his attention. She mentioned Kovacs, as well as others. Kovacs was a good young man as far as he was aware. Brash like most young folk however. yet he had still to learn that the boy had been absent over the year. "Are you certain?" The man asked, narrowing his eyes slightly more when adressing her. He pursed his lips and wiggled his nose. A sign of reflection. The girl had seemingly spent quite some time observing the castle's events. Whether or not these accusations were clouded by the vivid imagination of a child was yet to be proven, but important to note.

He had come here for one reason. To check what had been and was happening in the centuries old castle. He knew of the Eckenrode incident and how the mask was found and transported away. The mention of deathwitches was absurd. When she mentioned Ravenclaw he assumed it must be about the boy from the bogs some of his colleagues had been talking about. He had also heard that same boy had been prone to ramble. So again he was left with possible misguided information. Her information sounded an awful lot like that which Solomon had been speaking off. A grim look now dawned upon his face. It seemed he would need to have another chat with the headmaster if he wanted to find out more about these students.

"Could I have their names, Erin? Can you write them down for me? Each and every one of them?" His finger tapped the notebook. He needed to learn. Adapt to these happenings. If his little 'nora was to come here in several years, this place needed to be safe. And if danger was at Hogwarts' doorstep, he needed to snuff it out. But he knew too little for now. He smiled again at Erin, this time his eyes stayed trained on her face.

"Disappearances?"

Yes, she said disappearances. She shifted in her cot and drew her knees towards her. She frowned at him. "Yes, disappearances" she repeated although her voice quavered with that statement. "Not like I am a complete idiot" despite her grades suggesting otherwise, she muttered. Caradoc's internal musing however was correct, much of her conclusions were the product of an overactive imagination as well as a bit of suggestion. "And the smelly old ladies noticed too," she added her face turned away and her mouth full of marbles as she said that.

Professor Brown creeped her out. The smiling, honey warmth that seemed to ooze from him. She did not like it. That just meant he was better at hiding his truth. Concealing his darkness, suppressing the fiery anger and his fits of rage beneath a placid-seeming surface. She likened the Head of House to a still lake. The surface looks like a mirror, reflecting the heavens but beneath that impression was a dark place with teeth that bite and tear. 

"Could I have their names, Erin? Can you write them down for me? Each and every one of them?"

He tapped his notebook after he gave her the simple seeming instruction. 

She let out a sigh as she wrote Reid's name, there were others but they came back. They don't count anymore do they? "The rest don't count," she complained as if there was some set of rules she was supposed to follow. "Marcus DeWynter gone because his parents died," excuses. "Quinn Healy the Hufflepuff giant was in and out, eats people," she complained. "Reid Kovacs" the boy she punched that got her here to this place "goes from first year to Prefect to Head Boy to gone to back. "Howard White from here too, here than gone and then back and ready to kick asses when a few months earlier he would have teared up over spilled milk." There was a pattern actually, one she only noticed when she said it out loud. The ones that came back were mostly from Hufflepuff, less Marcus. What if there was a thread-thin chance that Marcus just happened to actually be gone? He was the same egotistical dick she remembered. Well, maybe. She was too stubborn to admit it to herself of course.


She had listed mostly Prefects in the notebook, there were a number of them. There were others, people that she did not notice, that much she was certain of. Then there were her dorm mates. She scribbled in their names, there were more gone than remained.

She stopped at Anastasia's name. She did not like the girl, in fact she did not like any of them. She just knew that they were there and then they were gone. That she had plenty of space to herself, something that she should not be complaining about but she was. "I remember them. They were here. Now they are not," she looked up at Caradoc and gave him a sour expression. "But it is not like you would have missed the fact that we are but a handful in my year, but we started with so many more." That was true, the only problem was, she was generalizing the phenomena. Some of these students simply moved away, found new schools. Some were likely expelled. Some were pulled from the school and were kept at home. But there were some that were in fact missing, just they were mixed in among those that would naturally return. In fact she had allied herself with the very cause of some of these absences, that old woman was hardly kind.  She just did not know the word hag.