The Godmother

6. sighted

ELIZABETH FELT GUILTY ABOUT SEVERUS' DISPOSITION BUT THERE WAS NOTHING THAT SHE COULD DO. His mind was set in stone on his opinion about Remus and Elizabeth. The damage had been done, and no guilty repentance from remembering 'what Lily would have done' would change that.

She taught the rest of the week, going over the same lesson and building on what she'd do for the rest of the year depending on what she students had shown her. The first years needed the most help. Being so young, naïve and clueless as to how magic actually worked, she spent all of Saturday determining a plan to whip them into shape so that they'd be ready by the end of the second semester to enter second year.

The second years were almost as bad as the first. Elizabeth had read of Gilderoy Lockhart's tribulations and inability to use magic as powerfully as he claimed, so it was no surprise that everyone was almost an entire level behind where they should have been for the year, apart from a few exceptional students who'd spent their holidays studying and revising.

She avoided Severus, ate with Remus and spent the rest of her time either teaching or formulating future lessons. There wasn't much room in between.

On Saturday, she didn't leave her room. There was too much work to be done. By lunch, she had finished the first years plan and tucked it away in her desk drawer. As she closed the desk, there was a knock at the door.

It opened and the small house elf Elizabeth had met on her first day clumsily walked in with a tray of beef stew and a glass of water.

"Hello Mistress," it greeted, "I's noticed Mistress Black wasn't at lunch or breakfast, so I's brings you some lunch," it explained.

"Oh," Elizabeth said with surprise as it set the stew down on the desk across from her. It looked around the room in wonder, staring at the posters of moving Holly Head Harpy players and live Wicked Sisters and Three-Headed Banshees. Its eyes were so beautiful. "Do you like Quidditch?", Elizabeth asked.

The elf turned around in horror, realising Elizabeth was watching it. "I's is sorry!", it squeaked. "I's wasn't trained properly! I's is so sorry Mistress Black!", it cried. It proceeded to throw its head against the brick wall.

Elizabeth jumped up, realising that the elf was punishing itself.

"No!", she shouted.

She threw her hands around the elves torso and picked it up. It smelt of beatroot juice and body odour. Its forehead was bleeding, leaking blood over its eyes. To add to that, it was wailing more loudly than Elizabeth had ever heard a house elf cry before.

She dropped it in the seat opposite to her desk for visitors and students and sighed to herself, watching the elf.

"I's sorry," it cried. It burst into another round of even louder tears and threw its head into its hands.

"Don't be sorry," she said, "Let me heal you," she offered.

The elf dropped its hands to its sides and gave Elizabeth an honest and penetrating look.

"Youse will fix me? After I's break rules and be's naughty?", the elf asked, its voice quivering.

"Yes, but only if you promise not to cry," Elizabeth said. She reached up to her desk past the beef stew to pick up her wand. When she turned around, the elf was desperately trying to hold in its tears but looked as though it was sucking on a lemon. She tried not to laugh and silently repaired the split forehead. After it healed over, she removed the blood from his face. No wasn't even the trace of a mark, let alone a scar left over. "Done," she said, smiling at it.

The elf smiled to itself and touched the centre of its forehead gratefully.

"Thanks you, Mistress Black," it said proudly. It jumped up from its seat. "If there is anything I's can do for you, please let I's know and I's will be endebted to get it fors you," it explained.