She couldn’t face home now.
But it wasn’t home.
Where was home?
Home wasn’t the new flat she’d been unpacking in earlier that evening.
Home wasn’t the old burned flat where Almasy had broken in[1].
Home was the tiny shack that Knox called a house. It was warm and cosy and safe. But Hannah had told him to back off and go back to his life without her to drag him down[2]. He’d done exactly that so he didn’t want her wrecked self on his doorstep.

Her second choice would perhaps be even less welcoming but he was a person she could face even if she hadn’t been able to in months. Hannah hadn’t said a word to her old friend since before the night of her kidnap[3]. She’d actively avoided him and now she actively sought him out.

The new address had been offered in an owl she’d never responded to. Hannah hadn’t needed to go home to see the letter and remind herself. She hadn’t bothered to change or wash or do anything other than escape the pub[4] and apparate. Her hands and clothes were still smeared in uncle Lawrence’s dried blood and her hair fell messily over her face, framing the still painful mark around her neck from where she’d been strangled by the silver. The red raw line was a stark contrast to her otherwise pale skin and the red rings around her eyes where she’d been crying. Baggy jumper and jeans were covered in dust and blood and her barefeet were cold and now rather grubby.

The mirrors in the lifts had laughed at her. The reflections of the broken witch had goaded as the lift had slowly creaked up to the floor which must have been where Johann now lived. There’d been no buttons so Hannah had been more than relieved when the lift stopped and the doors opened onto the correct floor. She couldn’t have slipped out fast enough.

There’d been no answer at door 2B and the wards in place had been well above Hannah’s skill level. So she’d lowered herself down in the quiet doorway to wait.

---

All she’d remembered was the cold of the doorstep before she heard the footsteps and her head snapped up to see Johann rounding the corner. Light brown eyes darted over his face and she pushed herself up uncomfortably to stand before him.
“Can I come in?”

1.	Clawing for the Wolf
2.	Wolf Song
3.	Sink Your Teeth in[/ur]
4.	[url=http://absitomen.com/index.php?topic=17597.0]Where Hannah had been forced to heal Lawrence Musgrave

As the lift ascended, Johann was contemplative, arms folded across his chest, chin lowered. It had been a good evening out with Pinn, one of his Ministry colleagues and her friends. New company, young faces, shrieks and whoops at fantastic fireworks in a November sky.

"The Leaky Cauldron," Pinn had yelled into his ear, her arm around his neck to bring him down to her height.
"There next?" He'd replied, and then caught sight of her expression - worry, whites of her eyes. A feeling of dread as they hurried back up to street level, to see from a distance. A smouldering heap at the top of the Alley.
"Go home," he'd told her, "we may be called in. We'll need clear heads."

The doors slid open onto the hallway that led to his home of three weeks now. He had thought to call up to Balfour, and paused in the lift, curious as to why it had not taken him to the third floor to knock on his lover's door. Resolutely, the doors remained open, expectant. Johann reached into his coat for his wand, stepping out only when it was in hand, eyes watching for unfamiliar shadows in the hallway. Two paces forward and the lift doors slid shut behind him, the familiar whirr of the lift retreating rather confirmed his fate to return to his own flat.

With trepidation he turned the corner, catching sight of a figure sat on the floor before his front door. Although his right hand went to raise his wand, it did not get far as his mind recognised the figure with such surprise his mouth fell open. Hannah Bombay was outside his front door - barefoot, covered in blood, looking beaten, much like the last time he had seen her back in September the day his father had died. His heart thumped in his chest and he tried to form a response, lips moving but no sound for just a moment.

"Yes, yes of course." He replied in just more than a whisper, about to ask her what on earth had happened, thinking better, turning to the door, looking back to her as if about to say something anyway.

The doorknob turned at the touch of his hand, wand-tip pressed just within the bottom of his fist against it. Layton had impressed the importance of good security, especially when working for Almasy.

The space behind the door was dark and he led the way in, quickly raising his wand above his head to bring up the lights. It suddenly revealed a set of doors to the left, one ahead, and a long set of bookcases opposite them. A glance about himself showed no difference to when he had left[1]. Johann turned back to let Hannah cross the threshold, glancing past her in to the hallway outside before he shut and warded the door again.

"Merlin," he spoke at last, eyes wide, still taking in her appearance as he stood before a row of hooks with the few other coats he now owned but rarely seemed to wear. There was an ugly red welt around her neck like she had been throttled. Someone had tried to do her harm!

His hands extended loosely towards her, wand in the crook of his right thumb. He was conscious of her hatred of being touched so didn't attempt it. He had never expected her to ever speak to him again, let alone turn up on his doorstep. He had done that once, when he had needed her. Now it was his turn to help her, perhaps. Like he'd been trying to for months.

"Hannah," he wet his cold lips ever so slightly, trying to keep calm despite the fact he was only a few feet from the witch he had resigned himself would never speak to him again. "Are you - what happened? Tell me what you need."

1.	2B House of Atreus

A set of dark blue eyes lingered on the painful welt around Hannah’s neck and she looked away uncomfortably. Perhaps it had been a mistake coming straight here. She’d resolved not to bother Johann again. He didn’t need the reminder about his father. He didn’t need the reminder she’d been accused of killing him and would have loved to have done the deed. He didn’t need the reminder that he’d kidnapped her and she’d ripped his leg apart with her teeth.

"Are you - what happened? Tell me what you need." True to form Johann fussed, eager to help the mess that had shown up on his doorstep. He had reached his hands out for a moment before deciding against it and Hannah wasn’t sure if she was relieved or sad to not be receiving an awkward hug from her awkward friend. If he was still a friend; it was nearly 5 months since they’d last spoken.

“A large glass of wine and a blanket.” Her words sounded like they’d come from someone else as the witch didn’t wait for an invite but started to walk down the corridor to what she presumed must be a living area. “Who have you robbed to afford this?” She didn’t want to talk about what had just happened. She wanted to talk about Johann and normality; a life she would never have again. She wanted to speak of work and his new flat and boring things; not death and torture and blood contracts.

Eye contact couldn’t be made again for a while. His question of asking what he could do had caused tears to form in the corner of her sore and tired eyes. She was on the brink of breaking down. She needed to break down. But she needed to remain strong and pretend she could deal with it. She needed to find a way to escape what she’d locked herself into.

"A large glass of wine and a blanket." Hannah told him, and headed further into the flat.

"I'll raise you a bottle of, and a bed." Johann replied, the tension in his shoulders dropping at the exchange. There was something rather familiar with it all, the mention of wine so often a feature of their time together. It suddenly made five months of being at odds fade away. Then again, the alcohol he'd already had that evening almost certainly helped.

He slid his coat from his shoulders and hung it behind him, the flat feeling ever so slightly cold in just the shirt that was underneath it.

"Who have you robbed to afford this?" Hannah asked, as Johann pulled open the door to the linen cupboard and yanked out a faded grey blanket that had been stowed at the bottom of his enlarged bag since he'd fled to Britain. It had been washed, but still sported a few holes and a frayed edge. It would swamp Hannah, being big enough for Johann to disappear under, but it was warm and heavy enough to feel comforting.

"I rent it from a private client who owns the building." He explained simply, closing the cupboard door again and glancing to Hannah who didn't look back at him. She was glancing around herself at the half empty bookshelves. "Ask me in a few months how I afford it, I've only lived here a few weeks. Er, bathroom's here if you want to wash." He glanced up and down her at the blood splattered up her clothes. He hoped it was just from helping with the casualties at the Leaky Cauldron, and that Hannah wasn't in trouble, but he would be more than his usual level of idiot if he believed that.

"That's the spare room, nothing in there," he pointed to the door beside the other side of the cupboard, "bedroom, and the rest is that way. Including the wine. Come, make yourself at home?" He walked round Hannah, his hand nearly grazing her arm in the space. Ahead of her he opened the final door, lighting more lamps with his wand as he made his way through the kitchen, the blanket folded under his left arm.

The living room was scattered with paperwork, not far off how the room he had occupied at Gabrielle Murray's had been. Hannah had been sound asleep for most of her visit there, admittedly. He tossed the blanket on the secondhand wine red sofa to the left of them, and extended his wand towards the dining table shoved against the wall and the desk. All signs of ink faded away, but the clutter remained.

"And that's the tour." He shrugged, "Which just leaves wine." He navigated around Hannah again back to the kitchen cupboards where he crouched to peer inside one. "Red or white? Are you hungry? I think I have food…" 

At the mention of a bed from her recently somewhat distanced friend, Hannah’s expression softened marginally. It didn’t bring a smile to her lips but she looked faintly less beaten and exhausted as her eyes brightened at the thought of not having to spend the night alone in the flat she’d gained through her new unwanted contract with Ira Almasy.

The ‘tour’ of Johann’s new home went by quickly as Hannah barely paid attention. Instead she longed to curl into a ball on his sofa and hide under the blanket until reality faded away. Finally the lanky wizard asked about the type of wine she wanted and Hannah crossed her arms uncomfortably as she stood in the doorway to the living area.
“I’m not hungry.” Her voice was distracted as she continued to avoid his eye contact. “Red.”

Without another word Hannah was gone from the doorstep, making her day down the corridor and into the bathroom. The door was promptly shut behind her and locked. Now it was the moment when she stood and the sink and stared directly into the mirror at her reflection. Tired eyes began to well up as they took in the red raw mark around her neck and the pale, ghostly features of her skin. Her eyes were bloodshot, dark circles forming underneath, her hair a matted disaster. There was a moment of silence before the emotion of the evening suddenly flooded her and the tears began to fall, streaming down her face. Her grip of the sink edge loosened and her knees buckled, causing her to fall to the floor, body now overtaken by racking sobs.

18 months ago Hannah had been a magical examiner hiding in the safety of her laboratory as she searched for and told the stories of the dead. She’d been respected and avoided and she’d been in control of her own life. Tonight she’d been tortured, shackled and branded because she was a filthy wolf; a beast that had no control, no freedom and no respect.

Hannah was leant against the bathtub as every last bit of emotion escaped, as she sobbed and wondered how in Merlin’s name she could have sunk so low.

Red it was. Johann looked between the labels of three amongst the collection of bottles. Not quite the best of the three, but not the worst either. Whereas he'd had a bit to drink that evening already with his colleague, Pinn, and her friends, he doubted Hannah had. Something half palatable was required.

He heard her bare feet leave the kitchen floor beside him and the sound of the bathroom door shutting. He stood and looked in the direction just as it closed, locking. He assumed she'd gone to wash and closed the cupboard, lifting down wine glasses and uncorking the bottle with his wand. The bottle gave a dull ring as the air pressure released in the quiet of the flat. Somewhere distantly a Muggle ambulance siren wailed, and then Johann's ears picked up a foreign sound over and above the faint sounds of London.

Johann's feet quietly carried him down the hallway back towards his front door, to the bathroom door, where he paused outside to be sure. Hannah was sobbing - he had never heard her cry. She didn't ever seem the sort who could. He laid a hand on the door.
"Hannah?" He asked softly, frowning. Was she hurt? Did she need his help? Would she ask?

Resolving he would be too slow to ask, his wand tip pressed to the lock on the door, pushing it open tentatively until he caught sight of her crumpled on the bathroom floor over the edge of the bath. His wand clattered to the tiled floor as he dropped to the floor beside her on his knees. Her sobs were raw, and very familiar to the ones he had been bent double with a month before over everything he had lost.

Without a thought of what he was doing, Johann turned to sit beside Hannah on the floor, his back to the bath and wrapped both long arms around her, pulling her much smaller body close to his.
"It's alright," He murmured, trying to reassure her, "You're alright, I've got you."

Back when the two of them had been held in sham engagement they had barely been able to touch each other. Now, eleven months on, Johann held a completely different outlook on that aspect of his life through his relationship with Balfour. He did not recoil at the thought of providing physical comfort, even to his estranged friend who was generally repulsed by it. His arms around her were no longer awkward as they had been once in her kitchen when he had turned up on her doorstep.

His left arm encircled her shoulders, his hand held her left shoulder pulling her face against the front of his shoulder over his shirt, while his right rested gently on the back of her waist, trying not to think of how small and frail she felt. Hannah Bombay was a ferocious fighter, even without her full moon transformations. He did not want to think of her as the wolf, that was not Hannah who had torn into his father, who he had thrown spells at. The wolf didn't recognise him. Right here, right now, Hannah Bombay was crying. In the two years of knowing her, he had never seen her quite this way - close, once, when they had accidentally shared a bed.

"Things must be bad if you've come to find me." He murmured into her matted hair, "… Hannah, let me help?" He lifted his right hand to brush back her hair, cradling the back of her head as she cried. 

Personal contact was normally an enormous wrong doing. It was normally something that sent Hannah running for the hills and wanting to cleanse herself. Two years ago she’d have recoiled, pushing her friend away, disgusted at the mere fact he’d even considered a hug. Hugging was weakness. Weak people were hugged as a comforter by someone stronger. Someone they were too willing to rely upon for their comfort and sanctuary.

Hannah Bombay was weak. She’d broken into thousands of irreparable pieces and she was probably never to be fixed. As Johann wrapped his arms around her sobbing body, Hannah fell into him seeking the comfort that the weak did of the strong. She needed a pair of arms around her and someone to tell her it would be okay.
Because it wouldn’t.
It would never be okay.

Healer Bombay…Hannah Bombay was a monster. She was a wretched wolf who’d been caged and tortured and thrown down into the dirt like the animal she now was. When she’d thought she could sink no lower she’d been strangled near to death and branded a beast.

"… Hannah, let me help?" Johann’s voice murmured gently but Hannah continued to sob. She’d held it in while treating her uncle. She’d stayed strong and defiant against Almasy until the pain had grown unbearable and now she was safe. Now she could release that enormous overpowering surge of emotion as her body shook in Johann’s arms.

It took at least five minutes for Hannah to finally calm herself down enough to speak. Her face was tear-streaked, red and blotchy. Johann’s shirt held the smears of her mascara. She didn’t pull away; instead she continued to grip onto Johann, her face buried against his shoulder as they sat in silence on the bathroom floor.

“Help me escape.” Her voice finally broke the silence that had taken over after her racking sobs had ceased. “I can’t stay here. Not now.”

He held her against him, stroking her hair gently, hoping it was comforting in some sense. The sobs sounded more that she had to get them out, ugly, noisy, her slight body shook. This was not the Leaky Cauldron, it didn't feel right, there was something wrong. Something worse. He was uneasy, but knew he could do nothing until she told him. All he could was be there and try to clean her up.

At last she quietened, but did not draw away. He loosened his grip ever so slightly to let her breathe. She had felt very cold when he had pulled her against him and now the heat from him seemed to have evened it out, together they felt warmer, though his backside was not so on the tiles. When she spoke, she sounded hoarse, but focused, decisive.

"Help me escape, I can't stay here. Not now."

"Escape?" Johann echoed, stroking away Hannah's hair before dropping his chin to try and see her face a little, to understand what she was saying, and caught sight of her wrists which bore the same marks as her neck. His hand which had been to her hair reached to take her left hand which clutched his shirt.

"Alright," He heard himself say, though his heart hurt to do this so soon after having Hannah back, "I promise." His arm pulled her tight again a moment and he closed his eyes regretfully for a moment.

"For now you're safe here, let me shelter you. You look exhausted, you're covered in blood. Let's at least clean you up. Draw you a bath…"

Without even asking for her approval, he reached for his ebony wand from the tile floor and extended it towards the taps to drawing hot water. Below it, the plug rattled into place. "Least I can do for the woman I asked to marry me." He muttered to her squeezing her gently. A little self-ridicule in attempt to lift Hannah's spirits as the water rushed down into the bath, noisily.

"Least I can do for the woman I asked to marry me." Johann’s voice seemed distant, like a weakened ghost from another room. Hannah could only clearly hear her own raspy breathes as she calmed from the crying. She was fighting the need to continue in a never ending flow of grief and pain, letting more tears fall and dampen the wizard’s clothes. She felt sick, exhausted yet alive, terrified yet furious. She felt alone while being completely smothered. Hannah found herself longing desperately for a release. She wanted a darkness to take hold and envelope her. She wanted out.

The words had been barely understood and yet Hannah felt she knew exactly how to respond. Her sore eyes locked on Johann’s blue.
“I shouldn’t have pushed you away then.” Probably one of the most sincere things Hannah Bombay had said to her friend was accompanied with a squeeze of his arm before she pulled back. “Perhaps as Mrs Storm I wouldn’t have been the disgusting dog that attracts so much trouble.”

With what felt like the strength and balance of a new born cub, Hannah pulled herself to her feet. The hot water streamed loudly into the bathtub, the inviting warmth an innocent chance to wash away the problems that laboured on her shoulders. Nothing could cleanse them. A warm bath wasn’t going to wash away the scars now adorning her body or the curse coursing through her veins.

This bath would clean her hands but it wouldn’t clean her soul.

Hannah's eyes met his as bathwater rushed down behind them, clattering and bubbling.
"You didn't." He admitted, letting her move away against his arm around her, still sat on the floor. "If anything, it might have made events more inevitable." His gaze dropped to the tiled floor, and he swallowed.

The cage, the blood, his father's screams, Hannah's wolf form so uncontrolled, feral, the inadequacy of his attempts to distract her, the crowd, Lawrence's aide…

Snapping back to present moment, Johann swept a hand over his curls, looking winded, and wide eyed and got to his feet, facing away from Hannah a moment as she got to her feet. Unable to meet her gaze a moment, feeling sick from the sudden overwhelming feeling of July's events rushing back at him, he managed to form a few words.

"You'll need a towel. Here." He tugged one from a haphazard pile, giving it a sniff to check it did not harbour any smell other than soap. "Help yourself to anything. I'll…" he glanced to her, but barely read her face, just enough to confirm she did not need him further at that very second, "be in the living room." He added, and nodded, "I'll find you something else to wear, perhaps."

He turned away, catching the bathroom door handle with one hand, pulling it back behind himself. Outside, his wand pointed at the lock again, and it turned - enough indication hopefully to Hannah that he respected her space, that he wasn't going to come back in.

His footsteps retreated down the hallway and he nudged open his own bedroom door, catching sight of himself in the mirror. As ever, he needed to sleep far more than he did. There was the faint sound of bathwater, of the pipes as he changed his shirt from the evening out to a t-shirt and a grey jumper. His hands sifted through clothes, looking for something that would be comfortable and suitable for his petite friend. Their height difference was laughable, but his build meant a t-shirt, his dressing gown, the arms rolled up, would perhaps go some way to provide an emergency outfit.

Johann folded each of them and placed them just outside the bathroom door in a neat pile so that Hannah would see them on opening the door. He didn't want to disturb her at that moment. He hoped the warm water was helping the other side of the door. His fingertips rested on the grain for just a moment as he considered if he should say, but he resolved to leave her be.




By the time Hannah emerged, Johann was sat at his desk in the living room, sorting through a few letters, distracting himself. One glass of wine and the rest of the bottle was poured and sat within easy reach of the sofa, and the other was on the desk, its level slightly depleted. At the sound of another person in the flat, he turned, managing to meet her gaze this time, and gestured to the red sofa where the grey blanket was slightly unfolded for her to disappear beneath if she felt the need.

"Sorry for the mess, I'm no less tidy than I was the times you've visited me before." He shrugged and turned back to scoop up the glass of wine, watching to see whether he would be better to take the armchair, or join her on the sofa if she felt she needed to hold onto him again, though something told him that was unlikely, however beaten Hannah Bombay appeared this time.

"You are welcome to stay, if you would like. Though, I have to be out to meet a client for nine tomorrow morning." It was just gone half-past eleven now.

There was a pause. He had to ask. The marks, the blood. He knew she had been dismissed from the hospital too. He had no idea what she was doing now to make ends meet.
"Are you in trouble, Hannah?" He asked tentatively, "Only, that wasn't your blood, was it?"

The dressing gown drowned her completely, covering legs and hands. The collar was lifted to her neck, a small attempt at hiding the scar around her neck. Looking at it in the mirror solidified her new found depression with the position she now found herself in. She’d not bothered to fold the arms of the gown over for her hands, instead leaving them loose and too long. Her wet hair fell loosely over slight shoulders as she left the bathroom and padded towards the living room on her bare feet.

A glass of wine stood beside the sofa and a blanket lay over the cushions ready for her hide underneath. As Johann apologised about the mess, Hannah made a beeline for the blanket and picket it up, wrapping it around her body and sitting down.

"Are you in trouble, Hannah?" Johann asked the young witch who refused to make eye contact with her friend. "Only, that wasn't your blood, was it?"

“It wasn’t mine, no.” She responded calmly, voice quiet but not holding the emotion it had before her bath. She wasn’t going to break down again. She couldn’t afford to. It was important to keep it together. Johann had seen enough. He already knew too much.

“Of course I’m in trouble, Johann,” It was easier to act her normal blunt self. “I’ve lost my job at St Mungo’s. Patients didn’t want to be healed by a monster. Everything that I was 2 years ago has gone and now I’m the beast that keeps breaking the law and endangering the public.”

Hannah was a lot calmer, though her appearance was still a far cry from his familiar friend. He wasn't sure if he was relieved to find out it wasn't her blood, that she hadn't sustained a terrible wound, just those strange marks. Then again, he'd had a few beers out and was halfway through a glass of wine, he wasn't thinking as straight as he might.

For their estrangement, Johann found it easier to read Hannah's mannerisms. They were all slightly new again, different in comparison to his memories. The fact they hadn't seen each other for a while meant he was naturally inclined to study them again.

"If that's what you want to believe." He replied matter-of-factly to Hannah's statement. The correspondence he'd been sorting through went back on the desk, and he grasped his wine instead. In one swift, but less exact motion he was up, and had taken two and a half strides across to the sofa, where Hannah had bundled herself into the blanket.

He didn't let her protest about sitting down beside her. It wasn't the sort of conversation to sit across from each other over. It was far too confrontational.
"But I don't." He told her more softly, setting down his glass. "I heard you'd been dismissed, ridiculous considering what a bloody brilliant healer you are." He spoke without any hesitation, the alcohol rather loosening his tongue. Johann brought his wand to his right hand and twisted a little on the cushion beside Hannah, lifting a hand very gingerly out to her damp hair, wordlessly casting calefax "It wasn't your fault the bastard decided to throw you in a cage without wolfsbane. Or that your best friend would propose at Christmas dinner and begin a farce." He twitched his wand, frowning as he paid attention to drying Hannah's hair as he did his own. He resolutely did not go near her neck, fearful of causing her pain.

"Had we known that a tattooed corpse[1] would be the beginning of …. well." For someone usually so adept at finding language, Johann was oddly stumped for words to describe what they had become. 

1.	Jan 23rd 2009, Real Knowledge is to Know the Extent of One's Ignorance (written in OOC Oct 2010!!)

Johann was sweet. He dried her hair with a gentle spell and he spoke kind words in order to comfort his friend but this was to no avail. Hannah had thought when she’d entered his flat that she needed comforting; another human being to hold her and tell her it would all be fine, that she would be fine. Perhaps she had been in need of the human when she’d broken down on the bathroom floor and Johann had scooped her up.
She wasn’t, however, broken down anymore. Now she was clean, changed and in rather desperate need of a drink of wine. The glass was cradled in her hands and she frowned down at the red liquid within. How easy it would have been right now to drown her sorrows in the alcohol and forget everything. How easy it would have been to marry Johann and live a lie. At least she would have had someone there. You didn’t need to love your husband did you?

“The beginning of hell.” The witch responded before she considered the impact of the words on her friend.  The wine glass was lifted to Hannah’s lips and she began to drink, draining the glass before she screwed her features and lowered it. It was strong and the vapours were quickly going to her head after a rather large glassful. Her wand was then out and she pointed it at the kitchen worksurface.
“Accio wine.” The bottle began to dance in her direction. “You weren’t the cause of my criminal record, Johann. You weren’t the reason I got thrown in a cell the first time. Once is enough for the world to brand you a dangerous monster.”

The bottle was grasped between thin fingers, her wand dropped onto the blanket and she began to pour again. Drowning the emotion definitely seemed like the wisest solution.

The warm air took a little while to really make a difference to Hannah's hair. She had quite a bit of it, and it curled more tightly for the heat. She finished his sentence bluntly and he paused about to use his fingertips to untangle her hair that was twisted in on itself. She drank her wine quickly to keep her mouth busy and he swallowed, trying not to dwell on it. Whatever had happened tonight had undoubtedly been upsetting otherwise she wouldn't have turned up here. But if it was hell, then at least he was the better part of it.

He let her go on with the wine. He had another in there, perhaps if she got herself a little drunk she'd sleep soundly at least. He finished drying her hair and slumped back onto the sofa beside her, scooping up his own glass which he sipped rather more conservatively. He'd already been out drinking earlier, and there was still the risk he'd be called into work in the morning with the explosion.

"Well, you know I don't agree with the world and its branding." He told her with a hollow tone. "But I'd rather a dangerous monster as a friend." Unwittingly, he was acquiring quite a few in that directory of friends, but they mostly kept their public faces on around him. He slung his feet up on his coffee table. His stockinged feet unseated a copy of a French newspaper La Gazette du Sorcier which his aunt and uncle worked for. The occupants of the photograph beneath the headline threw themselves to one side as they went.

"Did you want to tell me what happened tonight?" He asked tentatively, staring across the room at his desk. "I guess it wasn't the Leaky Cauldron. You had heard, right?"

Johann comfortably stretched out, legs occupying the coffee table and wine glass resting in his hand now that he’d dried her hair. He easily took up space, dominating the sofa in his new home. His companion was quite the opposite. The oversized blanket was wrapped tightly around her body, curled up on the sofa, knees drawn up to her chest to take up as little space as possible; to be as invisible as possible.


"Did you want to tell me what happened tonight?" The question came, invasive and scary. It was prying, interested. Hannah didn’t want to acknowledge the evening. She wanted to forget and fill her mind with alcoholic vapours from the wine, drowning out memories of being strangled and held by burning silver, of having her bones snapped in agony. One tiny relief was that Johann’s eyes didn’t study her when he asked the question. He may have noticed her sinking further into the blanket, becoming smaller yet.


"I guess it wasn't the Leaky Cauldron. You had heard, right?"
There had never been any denying that Hannah Bombay was a smart witch. Even in the numb and depressed state she was currently in, her brain started to piece together the sections of a bloody and cruel jigsaw from the night. Uncle Lawrence’s injuries, the urgency to have him healed, and his comments about a theatre and bonfire night. Very slowly, Hannah’s eyes that had been studying the wine in an attempt to avoid Johann’s gaze, lifted to meet it.


Unlike before when her voice had been weak and distant, Hannah now sounded focused as she addressed her friend.
“What happened at the Leaky Cauldron?” She was still practically shrinking into the blanket. “Was…was Lawrence Musgrave involved?”