The lights twinkled like Lumos and Nox, bright and dark again, on a desk in a cubicle across the aisle. One of Fauna's coworkers had set up a tiny twinkling tree, and Fauna's gaze strayed to it throughout the morning, the pile of paperwork left unread in front of her. She hadn't been in the office much this week, but it didn't take much these days to worry and distract her.

She set her face in her hands and rubbed at her tired eyes. Fauna felt useless here on Level Two, but felt even more useless at home. She floo'd from work and home, home and work, back and forth, and avoided venturing out into the open at night. She stayed inside, trying and failing to recreate the candle spell that had been used against them.

Letting her hands fall from her face, her gaze caught again on the lights, twinkling red, green, and blue in the tree.

How could one candle, one light, wreak so much havoc? The magic tied to it had been strong enough to quell the spells that would have provided help and escape.

Yet it had allowed her to fire at the dark wizards, and allowed the dark wizards to fire at her, and Bagnold, and Laz.

Fauna looked away and sighed. Roh was right. She needed to find someone to talk to before this festered.[1]

The question always swirled back to who. Though she trusted several of the Aurors to listen, they still outranked her, and she didn't want to negatively affect their opinion of her when she was months away from earning her red robes. As a trainee, she hesitated to pile it all on another trainee who had as little experience as she did.

Though her thoughts flitted to Bagnold, who had checked in on her a few times this week, she shook her head. Did he need to hear how she felt about the muggles, the wolves, and Tawse when he had seen it too and suffered his own injuries and pain? What if she said something hurtful, or made him feel like they hadn't done enough? She'd followed him into battle then and likely would again someday, but spilling feelings took a different kind of courage and trust.

Which left... who?

Not an Auror, not a trainee. Not a colleague who had been through the exact same thing. Someone with experience and wisdom to share. Someone who had always gone out of her way to be kind.

Fauna straightened at her desk. She stood, flicking her wand to steady the lights as she walked by.

She made her way down a hall that Aurors rarely frequented, and stopped in front of the closed door, her fist raised limply. In that moment she felt every inch like the Hufflepuff who had once been too shy to announce herself. She'd knocked so softly and so timidly that the Healer at the hut had made her close the door and do it all over again.

And that had been the start. The start of Fauna coming around, talking to Tulo about SAWS and her friends and her family and everything important to her. Getting to know Akiva, through Tulo. Meeting Raynor and Radley, through Tulo.

It was the start then and had circled back around.

She took a breath, knocked a few times, a rat-tat instead of a rat-a-tat-tat, and opened the door.

Standing in the doorway, she spotted the Healer who had been there for her at Hogwarts, and was here at the Ministry, just a hall away.

"Tulo?"

Fauna looked around, almost for an excuse, but the room was seemingly devoid of injured wixes.

"Do you have a few minutes?"

It had been too long. Already Thursday. She should have stopped by earlier to say that she was here and she was alive and some of the rumors flying around were true and some were false. She hadn't done that. She'd hid at her desk.

She ducked her head down and glanced up with a slight, guilty smile that wobbled at the corners.

1.	Dust Yourself Off

"Mint, ginger and ..." Tulojow's voice trailed off as she waved her wand in a serious of short flicks and the front row of jars marched off the shelf in a neat, little line to hover in the air at attention.  The bottles in the back of the cabinet jostled towards the front of the shelf, spinning in place like a model on a runway. 

Tulojow nodded as her eyes flickered over the contents.  "Might as well add on milk of thistle and honey." 

"Light or dark, Ms. Tulo?"  The little house elf, Pippy, asked as she glanced up from the miniature notepad in her hands.  Tulojow was eternally grateful to the little elf accepting her offer to serve as Tulojow's assistant at the Ministry just as she had at Hogwarts.  It was just as fortuitous that Knox had consented to letting the elf leave Hogwarts. 

Besides, Tulojow had a strong suspicion the house elf hadn't been entirely happy returning to other duties at the castle.  Though Pippy had never been treated like a house elf in the traditional sense of the word, her elfish tendencies had run true and she'd adapted to Tulojow's idiosyncrasies over the years of working with her.  One glance at the onyx spiral plug in the elf's right ear and the tea towel the elf wore that Tulojow had charmed into a miniature set of scrubs several years ago was enough to understand why the elf might have struggled to find her place back in the kitchens. 

So, despite the elf's initial wave of guilt-provoked anxiety when the offer had been extended, with the Headmaster's insistent permission, the elf had agreed to follow Tulojow to the Ministry. 

"Both."  Tulojow answered as she marched the potions' supplies back in place with a wave of her wand and closed the cabinet doors.  "Given the little snippets I've overheard, I predict a substantial amount of potion making and tea drinking in the coming months.  In fact, I think we should set up a cauldron of Puncture Tincture tomorrow to ferment over the weekend.  Maybe even-" 

"Tulo?"

A familiar voice called from the front room.  Since settling into her new role as Ministry Medic, Tulojow had taken care to cultivate a strong relationship with the most important individuals in the whole ministry: The Maintenance Wixes.  A few months of home-cooked cobblers, her famous cocoa and roast beef sandwiches, she'd easily recruited them to convert the original one-room closet office space into a much more functional three-room clinic with a central, front office and two additional rooms that opened off of it: a separate, proper exam room and a small kitchen with a wood stove, a central island and fireplace with cauldron for the primary purpose of potion making (and the secondary purpose of maintaining her usual supply of home nibbles and hot drinks for whomever needed healing that wasn't entirely physical). 

After giving Pippy a wink and a slow, deliberate nod, Tulojow stepped out of the kitchen and into office to greet Fauna Blake with a broad, warm smile. 

"Of course, my dear.  You know I will always make time - in fact, if you'd left me hanging another day, I had a mind to hunt you down."  An only partially hollow threat.  Stoicism was a common malignancy among law enforcement - both muggle and mundane - and a habit Tulojow was hoping to prevent the new recruits from developing.  Catching a glimpse of the slight tremble at the corners of Fauna's mouth, Tulojow cast a quick glance to make sure the office door was closed before extending her arms to draw the young woman into a warm hug.   

"I was just sitting down to some cocoa," Tulojow offered as she dropped her arms and led the way into the kitchen where a half-full mug of cocoa had appeared on the central island, in front of one of the cushioned stools.  "Care for a cup?"

A hug! Fauna hugged Tulo back gently and a little stiffly as she tried to keep it together, not wanting to blubber right off the bat. Thank Merlin no one else was around. It wasn't as if she could go around hugging Aurors! It wasn't as if she wanted to! No, she kept her feelings in check as much as possible on Level Two, but Tulo had known her since she was a wide-eyed, watery-eyed Hufflepuff, and had always looked out for her and encouraged her. When her family couldn't be around or didn't understand, Tulo was there.

Fauna had no doubt that the Healer would have found her if she'd waited any longer. As she followed her into the warmth of the kitchen and glanced at the jars floating above the shelves, she wished she hadn't waited so long. It smelled good in here, herbal and earthy like the hospital hut had at Hogwarts.

A mug of cocoa already sat on the counter. Hm. Suspicious timing! Fauna gave Tulo a knowing but grateful look as she took the seat next to her.

"I would love some cocoa, if it's not a bother. I can't resist chocolate. Hi Pippy," she smiled at the house elf, who was very quick at the cauldron.

"I should have stopped by earlier," she acknowledged with sheepish lift of her shoulders. "Just to let you know I was alright. It's easy to get caught up in the bustle around Level Two."

Ha, bustle. She'd been hiding at her desk.

"How has your week, er, been?" She wondered, genuinely curious about how she'd been this December, and finding it a good stall tactic to ask questions first.