Scourge PV Illowy MS

When the attack on Slytherin had happened, when the cursed students realized the severity of their situation, Illowy had never thought it would have gone on for this long. Nearly two and a half years, they'd suffered on like this; three come February. Now there was another house in danger as well. Despite her best attempts on her own, Illowy wasn't able to figure anything out about it for herself. Everything had just become a waiting game.

It was all routine now; the dull, constant burning through the week, followed by their dose of glittery liquid bandaid. A daily routine of wondering how long she was going to look like she did. In truth, she was only just finding her confidence again in spite of the black veins that marked her with the curse. At this point, what other choice did she have but to accept it for what it was, and carry on? There were worse things after all.

Illowy had come with the others for their potion when she'd seen the note urging from some kind of volunteer from one of the cursed by Nurse Brumby. Though she wasn't entirely sure what was going on or what precisely she was agreeing to, if it meant answers or something, anything, that might help herself and her peers, she wanted to be apart of it. Per his instruction, she came back to the Hospital Wing later in the day. Finding 'light' clothes proved to be a challenge since most of her attire these days served the singular purpose to hide the existent of her affliction as much as possible, but she did her best, taking care to have her hair securely out of her face.

Upon her arrival... it was a sight. Pale eyes swept about the wing at the others in the room, who all seemed as curious about what in the world the nurse was up to as she was. Illowy wouldn't go terribly far to say she knew the nurse very well, but even this had to be rather eccentric for even him and.... were those dragonhide gloves?? What in the world were they doing that needed dragonhide gloves. Luckily her need to know and faith that he surely knew what he was doing outweighed the impulse to turn on her heel and act like she'd never seen the man before as he greeted her and dropped a pile in her arms.

"Cookin'?" she echoed, watching him again, "Cookin' what exactly?" if he needed a souse chef, shouldn't they be in the kitchens? Or if it were medicine, surely they ought to go to the Potions classroom. There were a hundred things she could think to question in this moment, and yet, she instead went to an empty bed, dropping the pile into the bed and doing what she was told as she clasped the cape around her shoulders and tugged the cap on. Goggles in hand, she started back to the possibly mad man.

The young student Illowy was not usually one of many words, rather a serious type, it seemed, but Kels was glad that such an advanced subject had volunteered. It would be a lot less likely to get false negatives with how deeply the curse had advanced in her, and give him a good idea of time frame. While he fiddled about with readjusting his own gear, she asked a logical question, given that he hadn't spilled the beans yet. More an oversight than intentional vagueness.

"Oh. You. Wer cookin' you." Kels said, throwing his hands up as if to say 'what else do you see around here to cook'. "That there's flame resistant gear t'protect yer flammables. Yer skin is gonna be totally fine, but t'shadows shrink away from light an' flame. If we blast 'em long enough, the whole deal is jes' gonna get eaten up completely. Well, I hopes."

Kels gestured to the chair, but he'd be just as happy starting the process with her standing up. At this point, he drew his wand out, a fairly average sized chestnut stick that he held in a careless-looking grip. "Last kid I did this on was unconscious, so tell me if it hurts, or if it tries anythin' funny. Methinks wer gonna have'ta hold on it for a good long while. If we don't get it all, it jes' comes back. That is, I really think we can get it all, if we really go fer it. I think it burns in blue, jes' like plant fiber."

That was the gist, the stupid plan. Could the answer to this dark plague that had veiled these students in pain and sorrow really be as simple as a bath of blue flames? It didn't seem so unlikely when he saw the effects before. Since she had already agreed, he'd ask her to reveal the most easily accessed necrotized wound of her that served as the entryway for the initial 'bite'. Taking one last big breath that held with it a vestige of childlike hope, Kels would wave the wand above it with a practiced hand. "Caeruleus Inflamarae."

From there, Kels would keep a steady jet of bright blue flames piling over her, wave after wave. He was a deceptively powerful caster, the magnitude and strength of the fire could be frightening if not for the fact that they felt cool and calm. A first year nearby momentarily yelped in fear for Illowy's life before sheepishly tucking back under the covers when they realized they were the only one out of the loop. Insistent on being thorough, the wait would begin. At first, it was the same reaction as before, the veins near the fire would shirk away, as if merely trying to run and hide. Unable to advance by the golden potion, the shadow would start to evaporate silently, inch by inch.

OOC: The fire and the shadow will not cause any intense pain, but the activity of the shadow inside her will feel hot and scratching like a sore throat inside her veins. The cool fire that follows will soothe it. Feel free to depict this or react to it as you see fit. After several minutes pass, there will no longer be any pain at all, and Illowy will be able to see the veins on her arms slowly clear.

Illowy did her best to hide her initial look of shock as he explained his idea in such a cavalier, matter-of-fact manner; however her wide eyes might've given her away, along with another quick look around the room at the other students about to pay whiteness to this event that reinforced that she hadn't misheard him. Her gaze shifted back to the nurse as he gestured for her to take a seat; of which she tentatively obliged. Maybe she shouldn't have second guessed asking Bridget to come with her.

At least if something went wrong, she had the comfort of already being in the Hospital Wing; and after all, surely the school nurse of all people knew what he was doing. He'd have to have some kind of solid faith in himself if he was about to work on a student like this, right? Either way, she didn't have a choice but to have faith in him too. This was the point of no return as she nodded that she understood his instruction.

It took all the self control she had to swallow her nerves and keep her hands from shaking as she offered on of her arms. Nearest the elbow was one bit that covered a fair bit of her forearm and inched down to the back of her hand. Keen eyes watched as the man lifted his wand to cast the blue flames on her. This was certainly nothing she'd ever experienced before; being enveloped in flame. Being on her house's dueling team, naturally she'd been on fire plenty of times, but this wasn't the same thing and never to this magnitude.

In the beginning, Illowy wasn't incredibly aware of how fast or slow time was going; but at some point she felt almost feverish before a stinging sensation throughout her body made her wince a bit. It wasn't terribly painful, not compared to when she'd first been bitten, but it still stung. Slowly though, the flames lapping at her soothed away the heat and stinging, and as she was able to refocus herself back to watching the muddled veins on her arm... it was almost miraculous. The progress was slow, but steady as the black ink began to dissipate into nothing. Her gaze would shift back and forth between both her arms, almost in awe.

This had to be too good to be true, she thought to herself.

After several minutes had passed and the frantic energy of the room had simmered, Kels let up the concentration on the spell to check out the damage (or, lack of damage, as it were.) It was a striking difference already, almost like those videos when rescue teams clean up a feral kitten. Kels had never known what Illowy looked like without dark marks stretching all across her body. Without them, she looked normal again, like the curse was gone. He wouldn't be cheering right away though, he would circle the chair like a panther, checking carefully.

It was remarkable, better results than he could have hoped for in his wildest dreams. He was an optimistic guy, but he also had to be realistic in his line of work. "Hmmm..." Kels would not be jumping around and cheering, as much as the occasion maybe called for it. Had he held the fire for long enough, should he hold her under longer, was it all just going to come back in a few hours? "Hey, spend t'night in t'wing tonight, would ya?"

That would be the dismal fanfare to perhaps the greatest discovery the wing had seen in possibly decades. Tentative, continued observation. With whatever was causing this still apparently making newly cursed kids on the reg, this wouldn't be the last of it. Still, if it didn't come back over night, it was a good start. He'd return to his notebook on the desk, scribbling a few notes right away, but would continually look up at Illowy, as if expecting something to go horribly wrong any second.

OOC: Feel free to RP with Kels or solo further in this thread, thank you for being my guinea pig!
There will be a follow-up thread sometime in the near future for everyone, mentally prepare yourselves to be freed from this terrible curse!

Illowy looked from the vanishing marks to the nurse as the flames shrunk away. As the man seemed to fall into careful thought, Illowy looked down at herself again, taking off the goggles and pushing back the strange cape to examine her left shoulder - where she'd had the largest concentration of venom - and observed how there seemed to be nothing visibly left from the curse. Just the light dusting of pale freckles she hadn't seen in over two years.

Her attention when back to Nurse Brumby as he hummed in thought, circling her. From his expression, Illowy couldn't quite tell is he was pleased or skeptical or somewhere in between as he asked for her to stay the night in the Hospital Wing. Certainly no one ever wanted to stay there, but she wasn't going to argue about it. The girl simply nodded, figuring if something did go wrong and the marks came back, it was probably best to stay close by.

As he turned to go to his desk, Illowy stood, looking around the room a moment before moving to pick up one of the shiny bedside trays. Perhaps it might've seemed a bit vain, but she couldn't help it as she looked at the bleary reflection. It was strangely difficult to even recognize herself fully without that black stain. She'd become so use to it she'd forgotten what she looked like without it. Thin fingers brushed the skin, unable to help to keep wondering if this really might've been too good to be true. Surely it couldn't have been that easy? Would it be long before the marks would come back?

The snake sat on the edge of the empty bed, exhaling a breath she hadn't realized she'd been holding when she'd gone to look at her. Pale eyes shifted once more to the Nurse, feeling his gaze on her occasionally. Was he as worried as she was that this might've not worked? Or was he expected something worse to happen? If only she was a Legilimens.

"It could've been that easy all along?" she questioned, unsure if she was asking him directly or if her mind was so full that her thoughts were falling out of her mind and onto her tongue.

Kels had a large spiral bound book that sat in the drawer right in the middle of the nurses' station. Non-descript black cover would be thrown back with a few pages, no clear order to the notes inside. It was where he kept track of his moment-to-moment, nearly every significant thought he had. Well, for this one it started on September 1st, but there were bookshelves lined with them in his room at home. Those ones went back all the way to when he was 8-years-old, some of them even had epic comic strips and stick figure battles drawn in them, but that was beside the point.

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• 8 minutes under flame, dermal visibility of black ichor gone
• Observe for one month

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There wasn't really much more to say, it was way too early for optimism. He'd tap his quill on his chin, a bit lost in thought. What kind of creature put something inside these kids, was it malicious, or its nature? Regardless of if this worked, it didn't really solve the fundamental problem-- that something was causing it, and could possibly do even worse if given time to prove it. Still, where would he even begin... he struggled to concentrate.

It was before he could write a note about the thoughts he was forgetting, Illowy started speaking again. It made sense why she'd seem confused. "Man, I sure hope so." He'd say bluntly, shrugging. "Do you want a puzzle or a book of somethin'?"

Kels was getting used to kids now, he had been working at Hogwarts for almost a year by then. He wouldn't pretend like he could have a meaningful, super adult chat about curses or life or anything, but he'd try to cheer her up if he knew what to do. Lots of kids just wanted a distraction, which worked for him because he was a master distractor. "You like blackjack? Liar's dice?"

The girl sat the tray aside on the bed before she stood, crossing her arms over her stomach as she started towards his desk. She observed how he scribbled down in his notebook before shrugging to her question and offering her a puzzle book. She simply shook her head as she paused a few feet from his desk.

It was difficult to think of herself still like a kid. Granted, she knew she was one, 14 was hardly an adult... but when faced with things even adults had difficulty with, it was hard to remember. Kids weren't suppose to deal with these sorts of things. Their only job was suppose to be to learn and have fun at school, not fight for their life from some unknown curse.

As the nurse made another offer of something called blackjack and liar's dice, she raised a brow at him, "I don't know what that is." she said honestly, pursing her lips before adding, "Do you write all of your notes about the curse there? I have a whole notebook from the last two years about my theories on the curse and it's cause and cure... blue flames weren't on the list though. Honestly, my cure theories were a bit... messier." she admitted sheepishly. At least she was somewhat on the right track though with the light, just not the right spell.

"I don't know if you figured out what caused it, but I had a theory." Illowy offered, "I thought it might be akin to the Venomous Tentecula Juice. I read about it in the library, and a lot of the effect sounded similar; the discolouration and the burning sensation... I thought at least maybe the Venomous Tentecula plant might be involved. But I hit a dead end from there since there's no cure for it. And I couldn't figure out how exactly the curse would've been changed to make it mimic lycanthropy like I think it does. I imagined that, if the curse took it's due course, that it could be passed on to the next victim, like when a werewolf bites someone and infects the victim's blood." she explained, "Then that would make it possible that the shadow creatures that keep attacking students, might be turned victims themselves."

Illowy hadn't voiced her ideas to more then a small handful of people, and none of them had been faculty since she wasn't terribly confident in it; but it was the most competent theory she'd come up with, and if it might help prevent it from happening again, now was as good a time as ever to say something. The girl felt almost diffident, airing her ideas to someone she knew probably knew far more about such possibilities then she ever would; and for a moment, she felt silly offering them.

After jotting down his notes, Kels was surprised to see that the girl had already stood up and walked over, though he didn't blame her for being restless. She silently turned down his simple distractions. It wouldn't be an imposition though, but he did need to re-focus on her instead of letting himself get carried away with his own stream of consciousness. He he was straightening up a bit, she answered point blank, his opinions of fun games to pass the time being stuck in the mindset of a kid in an underpopulated village in the 90s. Luckily, instead of having to explain himself or how cards and dice were supposed to be entertaining, she started asking questions of her own. To his surprise, she was talking about his journal.

"Yeah, an' anythin' else." He'd answer, before she continued. He'd nod sympathetically, knowing the struggle, to a degree. Of course, he wasn't cursed when he was her age, but he had faced frustration and failure. "Well, that don't mean it was a waste of yer time. I'm sure you were learnin' a lot about healin' an' reasearch, right?"

When she asked if he figured it out, he shook his head in the negative, to which she them started to go on a bit of a mini-rant. Clearly this was something she had really dug her heels into. She was right though, it had some plausibility. Kels would just shrug though, "It would be wild if it were. It's not quite what I'd expect, but it's not like anythin' I've seen t'begin with."

With that, he jotted the note down as he did the notes before it.

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• Venomous Tentecula Juice?

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"Don't tell me yer gonna sit here obsessin' about it though." He'd say next, his lack of tact doing no one any favors. "It's been a rough time, hadn't it? Y'want a hug?"

Illowy didn't make it a habit to talk to the faculty and professors very often. As much as she loved learning, answering questions and generally trying to prove herself to be a good student, she never made it a habit take up much extra time with them. Even less often did she turned to them for help on matters beyond school work. Nurse Brumby didn't hold the same intimidating air that her other teachers did though; or maybe she was feeling a bit biased now that he'd hopefully saved her life.

"I learned more then I thought I'd ever care to. Potions and healing were never subjects I was particularly interested in. But you can never know too much about a thing, right?" she asked thoughtfully.

It was a little disappointing when he signaled that he still wasn't quite sure what it was that had actually caused the curse... but she hadn't expected as much. It seemed nobody had a clue what they were dealing with. He didn't seemed particularly enthused either about her amature theory, but it must have been a decent idea if he was scribbling it down. At least, that's what she'd comfort herself with, "Its the only thing I could really dig up. I'm just a fourth year so my resources are a bit... restricted." always a bitter pill to swallow when one knows new knowledge is just there with a crossing of a threshold. Yet the gate is locked and detention follows anyone who dared try to get by.

A small smile tugged the corner of her mouth when he asked if she's still be 'obsessing' over this whole ordeal, "I want to do whatever I'm able to to try to protect my friends and the school. No matter what needs to be done." she explained, every terrible thing that'd happened in the last four years flashing through her mind. To her, she felt a sense of responsibility, no matter what happened to her, to try and protect this place. Hogwarts was home. More then actual home, "So yeah. Probably. I've got a lot of pieces to put together." a small, sheepish chortle escaped her; some attempt to make light of every terrible thing that had happened. It was easier, safer, to show someone who cared what they needed to see. True to her house, that was her preferred form of self-preservation. Though she favored her usual stoic and colder default that would usually kept everyone else at arms length; just where she liked them. The world didn't need to know her vulnerabilities, or pay witness to her world falling apart while she scrambled to fix and maintain everything she'd dubbed her responsibility.

Then he offered a hug, and her expression faltered. Since the straw that broke the camel's back this summer, Illowy had rejected most attempts of comfort. She didn't want to be told everything was all better when she knew it wasn't. She didn't want to be lied to... but having just stepped away from the edge of a dark and unknowable fate, was it wrong to want entertain the idea that perhaps this really was the end of this particular horror?

Pressing her lips in a tight line, she gave a silent nod of her head. Yes, just for a moment, she wanted to let herself believe this part was over.