ᴛʜʀᴏᴜɢʜ ᴛʜᴇ ꜰᴏᴜʀᴛʜ ᴡᴀʟʟ | ᴍᴀʀᴀᴜᴅᴇʀꜱ ᴇʀᴀ

xliii. the end

Regulus shook his head. "Don't apologise." He stood to hug her. He kept her head buried in his chest as he caressed her hair and kissed the top of her head.

He had to keep reminding himself that she was safe. Bellatrix couldn't harm her ever again. And even more so, she was already awake.

Callie broke the hug. "How long had I been asleep?"

Regulus sat on her bed and shrugged. "A good week."

"A week?!"

"Yes," he said in an obviously tone. "You don't expect to wake up fast with that deep stab, do you?" He could remember how only a small portion of the dagger could be seen above her skin. But Regulus shook the image off. "And, Madam Pomfrey said there's poison in the dagger so she had to take it out and let your body recover from it."

"She also said you didn't leave."

"I could never. I wanted to be the first to see you when you wake up. I don't think you'd appreciate the loud presence of my brother and his friends after a long rest."

They both laughed at his joke. Her eyes landed on the four-legged stool he was sitting on.

"Isn't it tiring sleeping on a chair?" She thought he slept there while waiting for her.

"I slept on the bed next to yours." He cleared and pointed at the empty and used bed on his left.

"You didn't have to, you know?"

"I don't have to, but I want to." After what happened to her, Regulus wouldn't know how to handle her being injured again.

Callie's stomach cried.

"Someone's hungry."

"That someone didn't eat for a week, of course, she'd be hungry!"

Regulus laughed. "Wait here, I'll grab you dinner."

Dinner? Callie asked in her mind. She looked over the window as Regulus stood. It's already night? Indeed, the sky was starting to be painted dark blue already and the stars were beginning to twinkle.

As Regulus exited the hospital wing, she looked outside. The sun was only peeking and it was about to hide from the world. Another day was done. She leaned onto the metal headboard of her bed.

Regulus said it had been a week since everything. She promised her family she'd come back and explain everything. That was the time it sunk into Callie that she was alive. She survived and she would be able to go back to her family and explain herself. She didn't care if her parents would be mad at her. What mattered was she would be able to go back and forth between this world and hers.

She looked beneath her clothes. There it was, the World Turner, as she called it. It was still in one piece, the very thing that would keep her world——or worlds for that matter——intact.

The Marauders. She wondered where they were. Regulus' friends, Lily and the girls. Even if her memory was hazy, she remembered them on the battlefield. They all fought bravely and were safe, at least until before she blacked out.

The Death Eaters. She wanted to know if every last one of them was taken care of.

Callie also tried to remember if any fragment of Voldemort still lived. She couldn't let not even a drop of his soul remain. As far as she could remember, there was none.

Regulus came back with a tray of food for both of them. He laid it in front of her and she ate it happily, not caring whatever it was. Callie was too hungry to be choosy with what she ate.