Forests

Vulpe walked through the halls of Hogwarts, quick glances taking in her surroundings while she followed her nose. Draco had gone this way. She could smell the hints of her own blood and pain on the air, and then over that were all the hundreds of students scents. Sweet and sunshiney and coated all through with those wholesome teenage lust thoughts. Well, the older lot of them anyway. She stepped through a door to the outside and sighed happily as she left the walls of stone behind. Soon, a red fox made its way down to the edge of the Forbidden Forest, picking its way with neat little feet.

Draco watched with his customary sneer on his face, as Hagrid managed not to fumble his way through a lesson. When he felt the cold nose touch the skin of his ankle, he didn’t start. Vulpe would always manage to find him. It was a type of game for the two of them, when she could manage to slip her bonds. Just to find him, touch his ankle with her nose and then fade away into the stone walls of Malfoy Manor. As long as she could. The screams of rage and agony when she was caught always echoed off the walls like water falling from the fountains in the gardens. . .he shivered slightly.

Vulpe slipped out from beneath his robes, not having noticed by anyone there. Gryffindors and Slytherins were both as obtuse as each other, really. She ran up the fence railing and perched there, black eyes gleaming as she started swearing at the Nightshade Cats Hagrid had managed to restrain for his class. The gleaming, translucent feline specters eyed her warily, and then one of them spat something back in its liquid voice. Vulpe yipped laughter and growled something derogatory about its mother. The Cat flexed its midnight shaded paws, softly glowing shards of lights appearing from its barely there pads of fur and muscle.

“Oi, you get aw’ from there!” Hagrid rumbled. Vulpe carefully skipped backwards, and then in a somersault she shifted to balance on the top rail, tail holding her balance.

“Watch it, halfling, yarp, yarp!” She looked down at the Cat. “And I meant it about your mother. Cats. Blech. Only a cut above dogs.” A grin. The Cat yowled a challenge. “Oh, you think you can take me, cat? Watch me laugh, yarp. Laughing right here in your snooty bewhiskered face, kitty. Would you like some cream in a pink bowl, pussy?” She flipped so she was on her hands as she got down and stared in the infuriated Cat’s face, body almost perfectly vertical. Draco snickered, and she turned her head slightly. “Wanna start taking bets, dragon? Betcha I can beat the evermotherloving shit out of it, yarp, yarp.” She flipped the Cat off and it lunged for her fingers. She giggled.

“Vulpe, please. Try to restrain yourself.”

“But it’s a cat. Lithismaolilitosian!” The Cat snarled and leapt for her face as she insulted it. She patted its head, caressing its ears before swinging back up with a laugh. “Should we elucidate, oh perfect lover of my heart and soul?”

“Why ever not, most bewitching vixen of the wildfire magic?” The corner of Draco’s mouth twitched upwards.

“Ok, listen up all you students and sweet darling children. This is how it goes. Once there was life, and the Folk came to partake of it. Some frolicked with magic and it became a part of who they were. My mother was one of those. A fox touched and blazing with the chaotic side of the night and the wildness running sweet as fire through her mind.” Vulpe gestured at Draco, even though some of them seemed to have a clue. “Take it, oh dragon mine.”

“And then the darkness came and the fires were quenched. There was screaming, wailing and blood as the magic was taken from its original owners and imprisoned in books, wands and spells. Yet the wildfire continued to run where the twoleggers could not catch it. Your turn.” He nodded at her. She took it up again.

“And then some of them learnt the trick of taking on a twolegger shape so they could walk around easier. Of course, being a twolegger didn’t always mean safety. Sometimes it meant worse. And time passed and the wildones didn’t die out, though every magic family could tell you otherwise. We just became more adept at hiding, showing ourselves but rarely to those we thought we could trust.” She beamed for a moment, thinking of Severus. “We’re more fickle then unicorns, more wild then Hippogruffs, more chancy then a Dragon on its nest. And so we lived.”

“And then you went and got caught.”

“And then I got caught.” She nodded slowly. “Ice, do we continue? Or do we end?”

“I think we end, Fire.” She jumped into his arms, shifting halfway there so she was a fox when she hit his chest. He caught her easily and whispered endearments to her as he rubbed her ears. The class was in an uproar around them. She wiggled and he let her down. She shifted back into her slightly more human form.

“So, questions, class?” She leaned against Draco, one eyebrow delicately raised. “Whatever should we start with? How long one Wizard can hold the Crucio curse on a foxspirit before he or she passes out? I don’t think you saw it that time, Draco my darling child. Pettigrew passed out once.” He chuckled. “I swear to god, I am going to snap that little rat’s back one day.” She clicked her teeth together. “Bet he’ll even taste good after the Reynard damned snake.” Her head stiffened and she looked at the darkness of the Forest. “Don’t wait up, darling boy.” She walked steadily into the Forest and disappeared into the secluded shadows, there for a moment and then fading into the darkening shades.

“She can’ go in there!” Seamus said horrified. Draco arched an elegant eyebrow at him.

“Considering she was born there, I don’t think there will be a problem.” A gleam of her brush flickered for a moment, then was swallowed up by the darkening shadows of the brooding trees.

~*~*~*~

The trees of the Forbidden Forest sighed as she walked the ways beneath them, welcoming a wounded spirit home. Delicate faded wildflowers nodded sleepily beneath their outstretched branches, shaded from sunlight but still carpeting the ground. Vulpe had not realized to this moment how much she had missed it. The whispers of the trees as they discussed what was happening around them. The slow, immense thoughts of the oaks. The silvery brightness of the ashes and beeches. The slow rhythm of autumn, winter, spring, summer. Oh, how she’d missed it in that part of her soul that was tied to the earth. She was surprised sometimes that she hadn’t died from grief. Cut off and lonely. The pain was nothing, for wild animals know pain always passes. It was the disconnection from the earth that had caused her the most agony. . .

She passed under the trees, then paused and somersaulted into the branches of the tree above her. Soon, the muffled sounds she had heard grew louder and a herd of centaurs passed under her. Vulpe grinned and leapt from the one branch to another, ahead of them. She tucked her legs around the branch and dropped down in front of the leading stallion. “Booger booger!” She was gone before the flight of arrows could hit. “Gee, centaurs. Still no sense of humour. Hmmph.” Another volley. She was once more not there. “You really think you’d get a grip, yarp! Lighten up!” The twang of bowstrings greeted her. “You lot of dozy mules! Eeek!” Vulpe scrambled higher, throwing insults behind her as she climbed. “Carthorses! Mounts of men!”

“VULPE! Stop thy nonsense and cease thy noise. Where hast thou been, spirit beloved of fire?” A hoarse voice called out to her. Ah, she knew that voice. As no more arrows flew upwards to seek her out, she dropped gracefully to the ground. “Where have you been, fox?” The centaur stallion who addressed her had been white once, his hide fading into grey, grizzled beard covering his face, silvery strands of mane tied back into a ponytail. He stamped a cracked hoof restlessly as the other members of the herd muttered. “The stars spoke of you. . .”

“I hope it was something nice, Druce,” Vulpe said lightly as she walked towards him. They exchanged breaths, reacquainting themselves in the manner of horses.

“Pain, flamechild, pain. All they told was pain. Something is stirring and a darkness is coming.” He took her slight black gloved hands into his large rough ones. “A dark and terrible storm that even now starts to cloud our foretelling. They do not believe me, many of these young colts and fillies. But we know. . .”

“The flames speak to me of the same. There is a vessel to be found in the school.”

“Ah, the school. It is a wise idea, the school.”

“I miss Salazar and Godric,” Vulpe told him tearfully. “I wish, I wish-“

“Wishing accomplishes naught, red one. Naught at all.” He smiled calmly at her then enfolded her in a hug. She clung to him for a moment, breathing in his warm and honest scent, quickened with the gleam of his foretelling and inherent magic. They were cousins, of a sort, but the centaurs had forgotten how to be both two legger and beast or the mix between long ago. He smelled of herbs and wise age. She knew she smelt sharp and slightly like blood, because of her nature but Druce was an old, old friend. He would not hold it against her. These others did. She could feel it, the stares, the hate. Just because she was not the same as they, that she still had the wildfire burning bright within her soul! She stepped back from Druce slowly. “Why wast thou gone so long from the Forest?”

“I was trapped.”

“Who would do such a thing?” He asked in outrage.

“Voldemort. He will be dealt with, the wizards have a prophecy. But there are more important things afoot. I have need to find the people and animals mentioned in my dreams. I do not know them yet, but I will. Yarp, I will.”

“I do not doubt it. I will see thee again sometime within these hallowed lands.” She moved out of the way and the centaur herd galloped off to their interrupted grazing. She gazed after them for a moment, then decided it was time to move out of the woods. It had changed since she had been in it last. The spiders were everywhere. There had been only the one once, before she’d left. But now she could see the strands of their webs into everything. She did not want to be eaten so she left the Forest to its whispers.

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