A Hogwarts Intervention

Chapter 8: Unsettling Reactions

Umbridge stormed off toward her pink saturated office soon after the trio left for their quarters in the dungeon, completely ignoring the founders and the rest of the staff. The students who got to see the major smack down that the castle and Salazar Slytherin! gave to the vicious witch quickly excused themselves and hurried to inform their classmates. The staff simply sat there looking disturbed as they quietly finished their meal with McGonagall and Flitwick resisting the urge to yell at their colleagues for their blindness among other things.

"Did they say something about a... a blood quill?" Professor Sprout asked voice dropping to a horrified whisper.

"Yes, they did," Minerva said primly, without batting an eye and relieved that someone noticed one of the more important subjects of the conversation.

"We will have to ask them what Salazar meant or did we cover that when we visited them?" Flitwick asked, ending with a slight squeak in his voice.

"At the time we were more concerned about seeing they were alright and not trying to kill one another but yes, Lady Helga did go over that with us when we visited," Minerva answered calmly as she buttered a scone. "And I knew we couldn't do anything until after the holidays, that, however, did not keep me from having nightmares over both the quill and the medical scan she managed to get performed on Mr. Potter."

Both teachers ignored the violent flinch that Madam Pomfrey had at the mention of a medical scan on Harry. The rest of the still present staff, however did not.

"What did she find?" Madam Pince asked in dread.

As much as she chased the Golden Trio and their rivals the Silver Trio from her domain in the library she had also helped them find things in the library. She had been watching them and the books they checked out less to keep track of the books and more to try and make sure they had the help they would inevitably need. She personally knew that it was unlikely she would ever be near enough or fast enough to help them with her wand. Something she could do, as with Severus in both his school days and as a colleague, was to make sure that the information which would help them got into their hands. Pince would spend many late nights trying to figure out what the likely yearly crisis would be and encourage Hermione to read up on books that might connect or otherwise help with the situation. She knew that the young bibliophile would be able to recall the knowledge when it was needed and help anyone involved in the situation to survive.

"Do you want to hear the actual injuries that needed to be healed, the past levels of abuse, or the various enchantments all three of them were under?" Minerva asked sarcastically, practically spitting out the word abuse and earning a sharp look of censure from the small charms master. They both knew it was not something that Harry would want shared for all that it should have been reported long ago.

"I think that both Minerva and I need to be off, she promised me a friendly duel you see," Filius said quickly, more than sympathetic as to how upset his friend was and knowing that a duel would help her release her frustrations as well as help her guard her tongue. He quickly hopped off of his chair and led the still upset Deputy Headmistress from the very quiet room.

The staff slowly drifted away from the great hall pondering what they had unexpectedly learned. Poppy Pomfrey blindly made her way back to the hospital wing and pulled out two very specific medical files and stared at them for over an hour without actually seeing them. As much as Dumbledore had blocked some of what she had tried to do for both Harry and Severus but that didn't change the fact that she chose to obey him over the medical needs of her patients.

It was after midnight when the medi-witch made a snap decision, sealing the files, making copies, and summoning an elf before asking that the copies be delivered to Harry and Severus respectively. The elf was warned to tell them that only their new healer would be able to open the files and that she requested they have a check up with their new healer before the week was out. That done she put herself to bed and hoped the morning of boxing day wouldn't look so bleak as Christmas day had turned out to be.