As a professor, Mondays had always dragged terribly. They had been the day no professor or student had been eager to be sat in a classroom. The signalled the end of a restful weekend and the start of the struggle until the end of the week.
Miranda Storm had only experienced the drag of a Monday for a short amount of her career. She’d rarely kept regular work hours and the present day was no different. For her a working Monday tended to follow a working Sunday and Saturday. With a husband who rarely came home and a never ending list of jobs to do as Head Healer, she didn't have the time to experience the horror of a Monday.

But today she’d experienced it second hand with patients moaning and groaning about such a terrible start to their working week. Did they not realise how their healer was trapped in a never ending working week?
Her working Monday had ended late as usual, when she finally stepped into her office fireplace at 9PM and stepped out of the living room fireplace a few whirling motions later.

The first thing that made Miranda freeze was the lack of light in the house. Gerda always waited for her mistress, leaving lights on and being ready to prepare a drink and some food if necessary. If, for some reason, she wasn't there, the lights were still left on so Miranda wasn't stepping out into the darkness of the cold living room.
She froze, looking around in the gloom before her dark eyes gaze fell on an unusual shadow.
“Gerda?”

"Got any chocolate?" Asked a hollow voice with a nasal quality from the kitchen doorway. The query was clearly pronounced, Southern English accent. It showed no surprise for her arrival and was verging on casual query.
   
The wards on the house had been laughably easy to unpick. Elf magic, but nothing spectacular. Straightforward, trusting that nobody would particularly intend to take a few minutes to break them. The back door had given way with ease. The house was empty, no sign of the elf, no warm pans or kettle. The kitchen had yielded some food but no chocolate.
   
His fingers gripped his wand in the gloom, pointed straight at the silhouette of Miranda at the fireplace ever since she had appeared through it with via floo. He assumed Gerda was the house elf. Nobody in their right mind would name a child that.
   
"Gerda's gone."

The voice had made her jump in the darkness, not expecting a male. But in truth, she wasn't sure what she’d expected. Miranda’s hand slowly began to lower to her trouser pocket where her wand was kept. His voice held an odd similarity but she couldn't place it.
“Where is my house elf?” It was a vain attempt to keep her voice level and calm when she wanted to know who in Merlin’s name had broken into her home.
"Why, has she got the chocolate?" Came the drawling return, calm and in control. "Touch your wand and I'll break your hand."

Beneath her blouse Miranda’s heart increased its beat at the threat and her hand paused in its journey to her pocket.
“I can’t get you chocolate with a broken hand.” She tried.
"One hand is ample." Came the reply without hesitation.
“One hand…” It clicked.
Miranda didn't continue to lower her hand but, despite her better judgement, she started to slowly and carefully move towards the voice, heeled shoes clicking on the wooden floor.
“Musgrave.”
"Carter." His wand twitched ever so slightly, candles puttering into life behind her on the mantelpiece to light the other end of the long living room. "Or should I congratulate you on your second marriage?"
   
His wand was still outstretched towards her with precision. The light wasn't enough to see him clearly, but enough to make out his left arm was braced to the kitchen doorway, his weight slightly over to lean. The mop of curls he had from school was recognisable but longer and more straggly. Azkaban and the months since had not been easy on him, and his face wore it with dark shadows.

"Far enough." He snapped. She didn't stop but took another step.
“It’s my house.”

Another step.
"Come on now, I asked nicely."

The tone changed, there was a pause in the rhythm of the words as if something had interrupted.
“I’ll give you the chance now to leave and I won’t contact the aurors.” She took another step forward. “I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt that this was a big mistake on your part.” Her hand started to travel to her pocket again.

The wordless expelliarmus shot effortlessly from Lawrence's wand. In retrospect, he should have done it the moment she arrived home, but he hadn't anticipated she'd be so bold. Although the wand was not yet quite in her hand, it shot from her pocket and clattered to the floor, rolling under the sofa. With only one hand, he couldn't easily summon to catch it, so just put it out of reach instead.
   
"You'll sit down." The tone snapped back to the harsher, forceful authoritative tone that had suggested breaking her hand a moment before. With a twist and a flick, Miranda, disarmed, was unceremoniously shoved from her feet into the nearby armchair. Lawrence's approach was swift, wand never ceasing to point right at her.

In the middle of the living room floor he stood, stooped ever so slightly, a long dark cloak hanging from his shoulders, the bottom frayed. His face was pale, the skin had a shiny quality, and his eyes were bloodshot. Lawrence blinked more often than his intent stare suggested he wanted to, and he turned his head back and forth a little like his neck was stiff.

"I can still hear them." He spoke suddenly, quieter than before, and his shoulders rose and fell with quick respiration. "They're in here," He lifted his left arm, the cloak sleeve falling away to reveal the end of a sweater-sleeve but no hand protruding, and gestured to his head.

Frozen in the chair, Miranda fought to steady her breathing now that the urge to panic was stirring within. Musgrave was clearly insane, his brain addled by over a decade locked away in Azkaban with only rats for company. Her gaze shot from him to her wand now lying under the sofa. Now she was regretting never having tried harder in her defence lessons at school.

“It’s called a conscience.” She said it before she considered the words and instantly regretted it.
"I could tear your jaw out with the touch of my wand." The whites of his eyes flashed suddenly as he widened them wildly, taking two swift and purposeful steps towards her, lunging with his wand.

She pulled back in the armchair as far back as was possible, heart having nearly jumped from her chest. Hands were shaking as she put them out as a means of surrender.
“Okay.” Miranda whispered, her voice weak from fear. “Okay. I'm sorry, Lawrence.”
His proximity caused a mixture of unpleasant scents to reach her nose, perspiration and farm animals. He needed a bath rather than chocolate.
But so close it was evident how the wizard wasn't right and her gaze travelled cautiously over his face.
“What do you want?”

Seeing the reaction he wanted; Miranda's smart mouth turned from cocky responses to proper fear, he took two paces backwards slowly, dragging his muddy boots across the floor as he did.
"I want you." He replied simply, in a calmer tone thought doubtful it sounded any more reassuring as the threat that preceded it.
   
As suddenly as he had approached, he retreated another pace and sat down heavily on the sofa opposite Miranda, blinking purposefully. His wand was still pointed at her but not quite so forcefully, elbow bent. Something was getting in the way and he swayed his head again.
   
Hungry, so hungry, feast...
   
"I can hear them when I'm not with them. The screaming. When I am away from them." Miranda’s lips parted as she could hear a voice that wasn't Lawrence’s. Inside her head. She focused on it hard until the wizard spoke again.
Dark eyes didn't leave his. But as she considered why such voices were lingering in Musgrave’s mind, the Healer remembered the badge in the trouser pocket. A badge that she could work without her wand. One hand started to slip from the arm down to her lap.
“I can’t do anything about that, Musgrave.”

"You can, and you will." His right arm extended towards her sharply, head snapping up intently, agitated "Andy Carter Head Healer of St Mungo's Hospital. You'll fix my ruddy head. I've got dementors in my head!" He was on his feet again, right at Miranda as he seized her by the hair without mercy, wand still in his grasp too. "Tell me how I get them out-"

Miranda was jerked forward as the painful grasp brought tears to her eyes. Her hands shot up from searching for her badge to grabbing his hand above her head, struggling to wrench both her hair and wand from his grip as she was being pulled forward.
“Argh! Get off me!” Her heeled foot flew out, kicking him as hard as possible in the shin with the toe of her boots.

Lawrence let out a yell of anguish at the kick and twisted his hand, letting go of her hair, though a fair chunk of it came with his clammy grip around his wand either way. He retreated away again like a scorned cat, lip curling.
"Help me then, I won't hurt you if you help me Andy." The tone had dropped back again to a pitiful plea.

The hair wrenched from her scalp came with a yell as her hands flew to it. She wanted to ask why he'd even been around dementors but she didn't fancy the wizard and his stench so close again.
She waited a moment, letting her head recover before frowning up at the wizard.
"I'll help." Her hands lowered again, shaking. "But I can't without my wand," a pointed glance was sent in the direction of her wand under the sofa he'd been sat on, "or with yours pointing in my face."

In the low light, Lawrence looked from Miranda towards the sofa for a brief glance. His wand left her direction, and there was a rattle of wood against floor as the discarded wand travelled across the floor beneath.

Should have made Willy stay...

In strange silence other than the stray thought, Musgrave settled on the sofa opposite her, planting his foot on her wand as it appeared.
"What are you going to do?" He asked aware she could see her wand beneath his boot.

"If you want my help I need to hear your thoughts." Miranda eyed her wand on the floor for a split second. How she wished right now that she'd have taken that lesson with Ignan more seriously. "I can't see what's wrong with your mind if I don't."

But what she'd heard distantly, she couldn't resist asking.
"Who is Willy, Lawrence?"

"Who?" Musgrave spat back, too quickly. He didn't recall mentioning Shufflebottom, but now he'd been mentioned a stray memory from earlier in the month passed through his thoughts.

"… why not just get a big hoover?"[1]

"Jus' listen then," He replied and shuffled his shoulders uncomfortably at the thought, gaze dropping just a moment. He kicked her wand over to within easy grasp, his own still trained on her but not outstretched. In an instant as the wand came into reach of Mira, he switched moods, "I'll slice your throat if you do anything stupid Andy." His wand was raised and there was a wild look in his eye that eased as she showed no visible threat. The creeping feeling of despair was setting in.

Nobody would really miss me if I died.

"Well go on then."

As if he could read her mind and the consideration to use her wand against him, Musgrave snapped a harsh threat at her. She didn't allow herself to outwardly panic, instead pursing her lips and nodding. She took it slowly reaching down to her wand while her right hand slipped into her pocket, fingers clasping around the healers badge that was capable of alerting aurors in case of emergency. Cold gold began to heat up silently as the witch stood and finally withdrew her hand to be visible to the intruder.

Lawrence visibly flinched as Miranda got to her feet. He didn't like being the one sat down when the other was stood up, or that her wand was closing in on his head. Her hand reached out to his greasy locks and stopped just before touching, her lip curling in disgust. The wizard needed a good wash; a ministry cell would do him good.

The tip of his wand moved subtly to keep in the direction of her heart should he need to dispense with her quickly.

Her wand tip touched his head and she whispered "Legilimens."

Suddenly the room seemed to drop out like they'd fallen into water. Inside Lawrence's head, Miranda was suddenly at sea amongst a mix of churning memories mostly of Azkaban conditions. Amongst them was the same recurring scene of a ruddy-faced wizard guard (who had replaced dementors after the war) swinging his arm down, a lot of blood and an unholy scream. It was as if the dementors were in the room with them, inducing the outcome.

Outwardly, Lawrence breathed unsteadily, gaze unfocused, unable to see the outside world as he negotiated another person in his mind, something he would ordinarily respond to with violent force.

Despite her robes still cloaking her figure, a cold chill consumed Miranda's body as his thoughts span around her. Lawrence's attempt at shifting past a person caused the witch to refocus her mind, zeroing in on the figure.
"You must relax your mind, Musgrave. Let me in." She wasn't relaxed enough to be as efficient as normal. Her spare hand still shook with nerves, wary of the threats over her head and his far greater skill in wand work.

Guiding herself forward, after the wizard, the dementors came into view, casting a fearful darkness over both bodies.
"Try and relax, Lawrence," she reminded, voice calm and focused.

"I don't relax." Came the gruff response. The same crowd of voices that Mira had caught the trace of from Lawrence's straying thoughts was back, stronger, shifting from talking together to a muddle of different voices, hungry, thirsty, and with them an overriding, almost untenable feeling of misery. "This - this is all I hear since I've met with them."

The voices overwhelmed her, powerful and loud. Miranda finally began to pull back from his thoughts, focusing on her own spell, focusing on the need to get him paralysed and ready for the arrival of the aurors. He was in the most vulnerable position he could be in for her to try.

Her response to his explanation was to retreat, or so it felt. He wished he could too. Suddenly amongst his misery was a strong feeling of nervous anticipation that didn't come from him. Shit

She pulled her wand away from his head a touch and shouted, "PETRIFICUS TOTALLUS!"

His wand lurched forward, the two spells shot off at about the same moment, Lawrence throwing himself forward. The sofa blew backwards from beneath him. His spell shoved Miranda off her feet, though fortunately for her, in the direction of the armchair she'd only just left.

There was a scramble as both tried to catch their balance and arm themselves for the response.
"I didn't want to hurt you, Andy...!" Lawrence yelled, more in frustration, as if he was holding himself back and her actions gave him no choice but to, raising his wand. The candles in the room suddenly flared, and his face was visible, glistening wet with tears, more despair than anger. "I'll make you rue that. I know where to find you now."

The candles snuffed out, plunging them back into winter night and Lawrence fled. He threw open the back door before disapparating with a sharp crack scaring sleeping birds up into the night.

1.	Jan 2nd Through Gray Mist Creeping