build me up buttercup [s.black]

[38] Danger

"Expecto Patronum!"

Aisling screwed up her nose with concentration. Once again her heart sank as a thin silver mist was expelled from the end of her wand.

"You need to concentrate." Moody told her. "Like this. Expecto Patronum!"

He made a sweeping motion with his wand and from the end erupted the glowing form of a shaggy dog. It bounded around the room a few times before it disappeared.

"Oh, I'm supposed to be concentrating?" Aisling asked, arching an eyebrow. "I didn't think to try that."

"If you've had enough we can just stop, McCawley."

"No." She said quickly. "I can do this."

She closed her eyes and squared her shoulders, jaw set with steely resolve. Breathing out, she focused on a memory; the happiest one she could think of.

She was lying in Sirius' bed, her head resting on his chest as he breathed slowly and deeply. She looked up at him through her eyelashes, and smiled.

"What are you looking at me like that for?" She asked, raising a hand to stroke his cheek.

"No reason." He replied evasively, wrapping his arms more tightly around her.

"Tell meee." She whined.

He stared down at her with stormy grey eyes, and a soppy smile spread across his face.

"I just really bloody love you, McCawley."

"Expecto Patronum." She spoke the incantation softly, but as soon as the words had left her lips she knew something was different.

She felt an indescribable kind of energy surge through her and channel through her wand. When she opened her eyes she saw a pair of silver magpies swooping around the classroom. She smiled, eyes flitting around the classroom to follow them.

Suddenly, they heard a sound in the doorway. Aisling's concentration was broken and the birds shuddered and dissolved into the air. She moved towards the door and pushed it open, on the other side stood Severus Snape; eyes wide with a mixture of fear and glee. Surveying the scene, a look of dawning comprehension spread across his face as he put two and two together. Before Aisling could grab him, he turned on his heel and ran.

Ignoring Moody's shouts behind her, she set off running after Snape; every now and then she thought she had lost him, but sooner or later his dark head would show up again a few metres in front of her. She raced through the corridors, skidding to a halt at the doors and stopping only to wrench them open. Finally, they were out in the open and it was harder for Snape to hide. Aisling started sprinting again, ignoring the painful stitch in her side. Every few steps, Snape would turn around a fire a curse at Aisling. Barely dodging the beams of red and white light coming towards her, she sent them back; her throat raw from shouting hexes and counter-curses as well as running. She was catching up to him now, reaching out to grab the back of his robes.

*CRACK*

They had exited the school grounds, Snape had apparated.

Aisling leaned back against a wall, clutching her side. Once she had finally caught her breath, she set off back towards the school. The walk back up felt ten times longer than the race down to the gates. Face still burning red, she finally pushed open the doors into The Entrance Hall. She looked around, trying to find a member of staff, but it seemed that they were all elsewhere. She finally made up her mind and made her way up the many flights of stairs to Dumbledore's office.