Graves sat outside Madame Pomfrey’s office on the strictest orders that Miss LeFey was not to be disturbed. He had not bothered to don his invisibility cloak, so worried was he about his lady love. The pain she had felt had caused him panic enough, when it didn’t stop it caused so much more. He had rushed her down to the infirmary as quickly as he could manage, carrying her tightly in his arms.
He had been lucky in so far that the hallways had been empty, the students were all in class. He was now tucked just inside the door, so only a student coming to see Poppy might run into him, and the probability that a student would recognize him was fairly slim.
He clenched his hands and grit his teeth, his brow was knotted furiously with frustration. He couldn’t help her, something he hated to admit. He knew that the pain wasn’t terribly serious, it was what it portended that had him worried.
To his left was a white muslin screen, separating the rest of the infirmary from this area. Behind the screen was a girl in agony. Nothing Poppy did could cure her ills. The nurse had never seen someone brave such pain before. While she knew very well that Gwen was in anguish, the girl did not make a sound, or complain one bit.
She was lying on her side, curled up quietly and sipping some water. There was an empty basin, should she feel the urge to purge her stomach. There was another filled with water and cold compresses that Poppy reapplied to her head from time to time. She couldn’t figure out what was wrong and Gwen couldn’t communicate why it was happening.
This continued for several days before finally the pain broke and washed over her like so many waves in the ocean. She spent the first day pain-free just recuperating; she had no desire to relay what she had seen, not yet.
For the pain had not just been a premonition of things to come, it had brought with it a vision and the vision, not the pain had left her mute.