8 September 2012
Midnight, Saturday
Sellaphix house, London

It was a dark and stormy night when a witch with one glowing eye appeared in the green back garden of a row house in Marylebone. A flash of lightning illuminated her form; she was wearing a hooded cloak and there was a willowy wand in her hand.  After a pause, she began to move toward the house, her gait stilted by a pronounced limp.

Before she could reach the back door, however, it flew open. The owner of the house, Zelda Sellaphix, a wiry woman in her forties stood in the doorway, darkness behind her. She had her own wand leveled at the approaching figure.

"Not one more step," she said into the rain and blowing.

The Sellaphix family had befallen ills of late. Vindictive Aurors, seizing Pentrals, bone-snapping attacks on their oldest son. The Apparition had set off a ward the family had set since then. At this late hour, nothing good came with unexpected visitors.

"Who's there?"

"It's Talisha," came the voice of the figure. She wasn't able to stop short in a freeze, only managing a wobbly pause.

Zelda lowered her own wand and hurried forward, now seeing the state of their family lawyer.

"Merlin's bones," Zelda uttered, moving to Talisha's side to support her and help her into the house. Once inside the small modest kitchen, Zelda set the lantern alight and settled Talisha into a chair.

"What happened to you?" she breathed, kneeling before her. Talisha had lowered her hood. A false, pupil-less left eye glowed a faint blue. Blood was running down her face from somewhere in her hairline. She was favoring her left leg, keeping it extended in front of her, hand on the knee gingerly.

Zelda had some magical healing knowledge, but cuts and sprains were basic first aid that anyone should know. Like any good witch, there was a kit in the cupboard above the icebox.

Talisha's voice was shaky when she responded.

"I don't know. I didn't see it coming. Everything started to rattle and then it hit me. Something hit me."

Zelda began tending to the wound on Talisha's head, dabbing at it with something that stung. Talisha flinched but didn't resist. Zelda had not seen this particular glass eye of Talisha's before. The Sellaphixes had often enjoyed speculating on the strange witch's ocular accessories, for there seemed to be many which could only mean they served different purposes for the sly and savvy attorney.

Talisha lived alone in the village of Slandermouth in the north, on a shaky house on stilts too close to the water. Other than this, Zelda knew little about her only that she always helped when needed.

"You were in bed?" Zelda pushed. "Something came in while you slept."

Talisha hestitated. "No. I was up. I was ... scrying."

Ah. Zelda nodded, sensing that Talisha was admitting to more than she wanted to. This also seemed a clue to the ostentatious glowing blue eye, still tucked in Talisha's socket. It also explained the late hour and why Talisha hadn't Apparated to St. Mungo's.

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have come," Talisha said then and Zelda placed a hand on her good leg to encourage her to stay in place.

"Nonsense," Zelda said even though Talisha was probably right. The one-way street of secrets between lawyer and client was better left so oriented.

"Did you see it? What did it do?" Zelda continued. Looking at Talisha, it looked like she'd got a proper thumping. None of her injuries seemed to indicate accursed spell damage or the like.

"It was big," Talisha breathed. The description came easy to her, although details seemed harder to conjure. "Massive." Synonyms would do for the moment. "It wasn't dark and it wasn't light, it just was."

Talisha knew she must sound batty, but she sensed Zelda would not judge her. Zelda had been possessed by the tormented ghost of a dead witch - she knew 'batty' very well.

Zelda pulled away from Talisha's wound to prepare a dressing, but to also watch Talisha's tale-telling. Zelda asked, "was it a person? The shape of a person?"

Talisha shook her head, searching for it. "Could be. Maybe, a head and shoulders? Anyway, it threw the table and me with it, like an explosion but it wasn't magic."

Zelda paused. "It wasn't magic? Then what was it?"

"I mean, it wasn't witchcraft. It came from somewhere else."

A flash of lightning lit up the kitchen. Zelda always felt comforted by the rumble of thunder.

"Hold that there," was Zelda's reply, pressing Talisha's hand to a piece of treated gauze at her forehead, just past her hairline. Then she indicated Talisha's right leg that she was favoring.

"What about that? Can you walk?"

Talisha still seemed shaky. "I think - I think it's fine. I knocked it. Ungh!" She tried to move it and she flinched with some pain.

Zelda put hands to it, which got Talisha flinching again, but Zelda did what she would and Talisha seemed to know that she shouldn't fight her.

"I don't think it's broken, but you should go to St. Mungo's it the morning if it isn't better. I can give you something to sleep." Oh, she and Rafe, they had several things that would do the job.

The two witches continued for a little without needing to say anything more. Talisha collected herself while Zelda assembled a small packet of what she'd promised. Zelda had not offered Talisha a place to stay the night, but Talisha would not have accepted even if she had. Both witches seemed to know this without having to say so.

Besides, Talisha was sure, that thing, whatever it was, it would be gone now from her home in Slandermouth.

"Something for your leg, and for sleep," Zelda explained. There was a note inside with anything else that Talisha would need to know.

When Talisha began to move, Zelda assisted her to her feet.

"I can manage," Talisha claimed, and proved it by giving her hurt leg enough hobbling weight. She'd need to be able to make it to the garden to Apparate out from under the Sellaphix's wards. As she was going back out into the storm, Zelda stopped her.

"If you want to talk to the dead, Talisha, there are safer ways to do it," Zelda said.

Talisha faltered, a strange smile crossing her face, and her false eye catching the lightning glow. "Why, I wouldn't know what to say."

Fin