The Godmother

33. the middle of no where

Twelve hours later

The sun set across the French border, onlooking Italy. She sat on Mount Viso, the North-Western mountain range of the Italian-Switz-French border.

Though it wasn't snowing, the air as harsh and nippy. Being so high up, the wind fiercely bit against her skin. She sat on a tiny stool that she transfigured from a log that she'd found and sat out the front of her tent with a cinnamon and ginger tea in her hands, warming her palms gently.

The wind lashed against the tent. It was the same one she'd used to hide Sirius in, in the Forbidden Forest. It still had everything in it when she grabbed it.

She didn't have time to think about what she needed. She just needed to leave.

The more and more she'd thought about it, the more she realised that she truly needed to escape. To become nothing. Everlasting peace. Fighting the secrets of the wind.

How much she craved it. She felt like a bird. Who'd been in jail. And finally. Freedom. The strings bound to her arms and legs had been shaved. The brick wall standing in her way had been knocked down.

She refused to wallow. She couldn't sit still. Not with this.

Crying wasn't going to bring Sirius back.

Crying wasn't going to win a war.

The air was what she needed. The view of the gentle central-European countryside sent calamity running through her. Like a creek. Flowing easily.

The smell reminded her of Hogwarts. Less pine. More forest-y.

She sat in the pip of a clearing on the side of the mountain. It was a tiny clearing- just enough to pitch up the tent. She sat. Listening to the pines wash away the lasting debris of sadness. Like dried paint crackling away from a wall.

After Elizabeth watched the sun set, she returned back into the tent.

The chilly weather had made her cold, but with the temperature-regulating charm, the tent warmed her up. She could feel her blood flowing through her veins. Warming up her skin.

Who was she, really?

A warrior? A sacrifice?

Good?

Bad?

The feeling of loneliness captured her. She ravelled in it. Let it consume her.

Loneliness is the human condition. No one is going to fill that space.

She compacted the tent the next morning. She woke with the sun and packed away everything so that it could fit into her backpack. Then, she started apparating.

It was hard and consuming.

She couldn't jump too far, or else she'd get dizzy and pass out from exhaustion.

Elizabeth made it through Italy, eventually. She cut through tiny villages and towns, apparating behind buildings and in alleyways. Taking a half-an-hour break between each jump. She drank plenty of water. Ate bread and jam.

She felt like an escapee. Is this what it was like for Sirius when he first escaped Azkaban?

Living like the sun. No strings. No stability.

Anything could collapse in on itself at any minute.

She could lose her food or her wand? The tent could crumble irreparably. The rain could perish everything.

But she needed to be free. She couldn't go back. Not now.

It had been two days.

Two days since the arrest. Since she'd last been home. Scrambling around. Trying to figure out what life was. What to put in her bag.