"She'll never forgive us if she finds out," Ron whispered, his wand light flickering against the gnarled roots of an ancient oak. "We're out here facing Merlin-knows-what, and she's back there tucked in silk."
"It's for the best, Ron," Hermione snapped, though her eyes were rimmed with red from anxiety. "Look at her. She's so skinny, so fine-boned—she's like a bird. A single gust of this wind could make her catch a fever. We are the shields. We stay in the dark so she can stay in the light."
The Invisible ShadowBut the "Circle" had underestimated the pull of the forest on their Queen.
While they trudged through the muck with a whimpering Draco Malfoy, a small shadow glided through the trees behind them. Ana moved with a terrifying fluidity, her velvet dressing gown snagging on thorns that seemed to retract the moment they touched her skin. She didn't need a lamp; the silver moonstone at her throat pulsed with a rhythmic, violet light that guided her feet.
She wasn't following them. She was following the scent of dying magic.
The Clearing of the SlainIn the heart of the grove, the air turned frigid. Harry and Draco stumbled into a clearing where a unicorn lay, its coat a brilliant, tragic white against the black mud. A hooded figure, draped in tattered rags, was hunched over the creature, lapping at the shimmering silver blood.
Malfoy let out a piercing scream and vanished into the trees. Harry fell backward, his glasses slipping, as the hooded terror turned its invisible gaze toward him. It began to crawl across the moss, a soul-chilling hiss vibrating from its throat.
"Stop."
The word was low, melodic, and absolute.
Ana stepped out from the gloom. She looked impossibly delicate standing amidst the gore—a pale, skinny girl in a nightgown—but as she faced the cloaked horror, the forest went dead silent.
"Leave him," she commanded.
The silver moonstone flared with a blinding light. The hooded figure recoiled as if struck by a physical blow, its rags fluttering in a wind that didn't exist. It let out a pained, rattling sound and retreated into the darkness, vanishing like a bad dream.
"The forest, Ana? The forest?" Cassandra's voice cracked, her hands trembling as she pointed toward the damp, mud-stained hem of Ana's velvet dressing gown. "In the middle of the night? Without a word to us?"
"We woke up and your bed was cold," Lavender wailed, her devotion turning into a jagged, panicked scold. "We thought you'd been taken! We thought someone had snatched you out from under our noses because you're so skinny, so easy to carry away!"
Hermione stood by the door, her chest heaving. "We went out there to be your shield, Ana! We faced that... that thing so you wouldn't have to see a drop of blood! And you were there the whole time? Exposing yourself to the damp and the dark?"
They paced around her like a pack of wolves guarding a wounded pup. Their words were sharp, born of a deep-seated fear that they had failed in their singular purpose: keeping the fragile heart of the tower beating.
The Sovereign's SubmissionAna stood in the center of the rug, her skinny frame looking smaller than ever under the weight of their collective anger. She didn't argue. She didn't use her voice to command them into silence.
Instead, she did something that stopped the air in their lungs.
Slowly, gracefully, Ana sank to her knees on the cold stone floor. She looked up at them, her silver eyes wide and misty, her small hands clasped together against her chest.
"I am sorry," she whispered, her voice a melodic, heartbreaking chime. "I didn't mean to make your hearts ache. I was selfish to leave the circle. Please... forgive me for scaring you."
The Instant AbsolutionThe effect was instantaneous. The fury that had filled the room didn't just fade—it evaporated, replaced by a wave of desperate, agonizing love.
"Oh, Ana—no! Stand up!" Hermione cried, throwing herself onto the floor beside her. She wrapped her arms around Ana's narrow shoulders, pulling the girl's head into the crook of her neck. "Don't kneel to us! Never to us!"
Cassandra and Lavender were on the ground a second later, their anger replaced by a frantic need to soothe.
"We're sorry! We shouldn't have shouted!" Cassandra sobbed, reaching out to stroke Ana's pale, skinny cheek. "We were just so scared, sweetling. The thought of a single scratch on your skin... we couldn't bear it."
Cho Chang took Ana's cold hands into her own, pressing them to her lips. "You're forgiven. You're always forgiven. Just never, ever leave us again. Promise us, Ana. Promise you'll let us carry the weight for you."
The Sheltered NightThe "Grounded" sentence remained, but it had shifted from a punishment into a frantic, suffocating luxury. They didn't let Ana stand up on her own; they lifted her bodily from the floor, Hermione and Cassandra catching her under her arms as if she were made of gossamer.
They stripped the damp clothes from her skinny body with frantic, apologetic touches, replacing them with a fresh nightgown that had been warmed by the fire until it was like a heated cloud.
"You're staying in this bed for the rest of the week," Lavender declared, tucking the heavy wool blankets so tightly around Ana that she could barely move her arms. "We'll bring your meals. We'll do your homework. You aren't to set a single toe on the floor until we say the air is warm enough."
Ana lay back against the mountain of pillows, the moonstone at her throat pulsing a soft, satisfied violet. Around her, the four girls began their vigil, sitting on the edges of her bed and the rug below, watching her with a renewed, feverish intensity.
She had asked for forgiveness, and in doing so, she had bound them tighter than any command ever could.