2Aesop Sharp's Pov
As she collided into his chest, she let out a frightened scream that echoed through the corridor like a wail of a banshee. He grunted and glared in the direction of Peeves as he disappeared, leaving behind a cackling laughter. Her bumping into him made him grab the handrail of the stairwell, trying to steady himself to avoid falling over backward, but his leg throbbed with pain, protesting the sudden and awkward movement he made to prevent himself from falling.
Aesop Sharp was making his way down the steps to go to his classroom, as he made his way down he was contemplating the long day that was ahead of him. There was a lot of early morning grading left to do on the exams his students had taken, as well as some potion-brewing that he needed to attend to. He had hoped he would be done before breakfast but now he was thinking that might not be the case. He glanced down to see the top the auburn redhead that had collided into his chest. Her scream had echoed causing his ears to ring and the sleeping portraits in the vicinity to startle awake.
"What is Merlin's name?!" One of the doors along the corridor opened and Eleazar Fig looked out into the hallway dressed in his nightly pajamas. It looked like he was startled awake too and had come to see what the commotion was about, but when he had opened the door, the trap that Peeves had made came crashing down on to Eleazar with a loud pop and splat of white paint on his head, causing Eleazar to exclaim in shock.
The woman ran, without so much as a look at him or Eleazar, heading for the doors and bursting through the door and into the Gryffindor Tower corridor that led to the grand staircase. She left behind a trail of bloody footprints and she was dressed in the Hospital Wing's patients attire. Damn, she was finally awake and is now making a run for it. He thought as he moved to chase after her.
It had been an exhausting two weeks for him, Eleazar and Mirabel, the herbology professor. The woman who showed up out of nowhere in the Great Hall had been fighting an illness for the past two weeks. The woman had slipped in and out of consciousness for days fighting a nasty fever and had needed specialized and stronger potions to fight it off. Aesop had to brew and doctored up and try new recipes to see if they would work, not that he would complain about that as it helped him out with his current research for his blasted leg injury, but the physical strain and time constraint made things difficult. Mirabel was up every day pruning her garden and providing fresh and hard to obtain ingredients for Aesop. Eleazar, unable to talk to the woman, had spent most of his days and nights studying and looking into all kinds of books on Ancient Magic he could get his hands on, the bags under his eyes were terrible. It didn't take long to fix and repair the castle after the first few days after the eventful earthquake, but it did add onto most of the school's faculty's workload. Matilda had tried to reason with Black about taking the girl to St. Mungo's for medical treatment after nurse Blainey had nearly fainted from fatigue, Black, however, not wanting to have his image tainted, said no on the matter.
Aesop moved past the bewildered, paint covered, Eleazar and went after the frightened woman cursing peeves as he did so. "Damn poltergeist."
The woman had taken a left and was running past the humpback witch, heading for the spiral grand staircase. The ground began to rumble as it always did when it indicated that the stairs were going to move. To Aesop's alarm however the stairs weren't spreading outwards like they usually do when someone approached them, instead they were going back into the wall, as if the castle itself was also trying to stop the woman from running away. This however was not a good scenario, it meant that the woman was running headlong into a ledge with no guardrail and a sheer drop all the way down to the dungeons themselves.
Aesop was now running himself ignoring the pain in his leg as a surge of adrenaline coursed through him. He whipped out his wand with a flick of his wrist, the handle of it gliding into his palm, without hesitating for even a second he made a flick and swish movement in the shape of a capital M toward the woman.
"Aresto Momentum!" He said quickly and clearly.
A jet of white light shot out of his wand and hit the back of the woman just as she found herself with no floor below her feet. This caused her to freeze midair, but still falling as if in slow motion.
Aesop was close enough to her now to reach her and he could see the fear on her face as she stared down at sheer drop beneath her. He reached out and grabbed her patient gown by the collar, yanking her back to safety as he ended the spell, and not for the first time that morning, she collided into his chest again with a scream. He wrapped his arm around her waist as she began to struggle in his grasp, still trying to escape.
He grunted as he struggled to keep a hold of her. He wondered briefly if he should use incarcerous on the woman. "I implore you to remain tranquil, I harbor no malevolent intent towards you."
She stilled at the sound of his voice and finally looked up at him. They were both breathing heavily, but his breath was knocked out of him again when he looked into her eyes. Her eyes were wide from adrenaline and panic, but they were a bright light bluish green speckled with bits of golden brown at the center. They reminded him of an early morning just as dawn began to rise. He had heard of heterochromia eyes before but he had never seen someone with them before and hers were breathtakingly beautiful.
"Godric's Heart. Are you alright?" Asked Eleazar. He had apparently followed them, paint nowhere to be seen on him. He must have quickly cast a scourgify on himself and vanished the paint all together.
Both of them became aware of how close they were and Aesop let go of the woman. He cleared his throat. "I'm alright, Eleazar. Was able to catch her before she could plummet to her death."
"Right," Eleazar let out a sigh of relief and turned to take a look at the woman. "I'm glad to see you're finally up and about, instead of thrashing around in your sleep. You have been terribly ill for quite some time, and we were beginning to wonder if you would ever wake."
The woman looked between Eleazar and Aesop. She was shivering, whether from the cold or shock, Aesop could not tell. She continued to look around her as if unsure of her surroundings and finally she took in a deep breath and straightened her back as if to strengthen her resolve.
"Who are you?" She asked slowly and cautiously in a hoarse voice that sounded raspy and scratchy from the lack of use.
"Ah, right. I believe some introductions are in order. My name is Eleazar Fig," Eleazar had introduced himself and then motioned his hand at Aesop. "I'm a professor at this school, this person here is my colleague Aesop Sharp. Might I have the pleasure to know your name miss?"
"A…Adrienne. Adrienne Andrathath." She responded.
"Hmm. I figured as much, pleasure is all mine, Miss. Andrathath." Eleazar responded.
Adrienne had a look of confusion on her face. "You already knew my name?" She asked.
"Yes. A lot has happened while you were unconscious these past two weeks…" Eleazar began.
"Two weeks!? I was unconscious for two weeks!? More importantly, where am I? How did I get here? Where did the stairs go?" Adrienne still looked frightened and looked like she would begin to hyperventilate or go into hysterics. She looked behind her to look at the stairwell that was once there but now not anymore.
Eleazar looked to Aesop. Aesop sighed and took a step toward the woman. "Calm yourself, Miss Andrathath. Perhaps we can exchange some inquiries over a hot cup of tea? I'm sure some tea will help calm your nerves. Eleazar and I can answer any questions you have while you can answer our questions. We have all been curious about you. Also you appear injured and need medical treatment"
Aesop watched Adrienne look confused before he pointed down to her feet which appeared to be bleeding. He watched her bite her bottom lip with a furrowed brow as she seemed to contemplate her choices.
"If you try to run I'll just incarcerous you and drag you back to the Hospital Wing." Aesop threatened.
"Aesop!" Eleazar exclaimed at Aesop's light threat and looked to Adrienne to reassure her. "I apologize for my colleague's rude statement."
"Alright," She said finally. "I want to know what's going on and running away from it won't give me any answers."
"Are you able to walk?" Eleazar asked, keeping in mind her injured feet.
Adrienne gave a nod. "Yes, I'll be able to walk." She limped forward wincing a little bit. Eleazar had reached out a hand toward her as if to help her but she shied away and stubbornly walked forward.
Aesop and Eleazar exchanged one more glance before Eleazar began to lead Adrienne back toward the Faculty Wing.
"Perhap it would be better to use your room, Eleazar, instead of making the poor girl climb all those stairs." Aesop said as he followed behind them. He didn't expect her to run again, but he wasn't gonna chance it. There were still too many unanswered questions.
"I believe that should be best." Eleazar agreed.
A rumble began again and Aesop glanced behind him as the stairs went back into place. It wasn't like the castle to move the stairs when someone approached them. It really did seem like the castle was trying to keep the woman from running off, which meant the castle was sentient enough to want to keep her there. Aesop frowned as it just brought some more unanswered questions.
Just who are you, Adrienne? He thought.
I AM SO SORRY!
I know this chapter is short and late... like so so so late! I got caught up in my spring semester in college. WHOSE IDEA WAS IT FOR MY PROFESSORS TO GIVE ME EXAMS EVERY WEEK!? I was about to pull my hair out in frustration.
But anyway I hope you liked this update!