A Dragon's Soul

A Dragon's Soul Part 23

"What is it? What's going on?" Harry asks as he rushes over with Bill, having heard Charlie's yells for help.

"She can't feel her legs," Charlie murmurs eventually and the two other men gasp in shock and dismay.

"Oh God," Harry moans eventually, sinking to the floor, his back against the wall, "it's not fair," he adds, tears gathering in his eyes.

"Hey, hey, we don't know what's going on yet do we? Let's not condemn her to a life without her legs just yet ay?" Bill tries, his own voice wavering ever so slightly as he stands before Harry, his hand outstretched, "besides," he says looking at both Harry and his brother, "she'll be in enough pain and she needs our support," they both look at him in slight confusion, their brows furrowed as they stare at him.

"Why would you even say that Bill? As if I wouldn't stand by her," Charlie growls slightly and Bill sighs, wondering briefly when Charlie had become more volatile than Ron or himself before he turns to answer him.

"Sometimes I wonder if you know her at all," he exclaims, a bit of frustration seeping into his own tone as he does so, "of course you'll stand by her, we all will, I know that but think about who she is for a second, she'll think she's being a burden, she'll think she's not good enough and she'll try to push you away, she'll try to push us all away so you need to be prepared we all do," he finishes and Charlie has the good grace to look a little shamefaced as he realises the truth in what Bill has said.

"So what do we do?" Harry croaks out eventually, his eyes pleading with Bill to make everything better and it breaks the older mans heart that this kid, for that is what he was still, a child, a seventeen year old who should be busy causing trouble instead of suffering still. He had spent his life fighting a war he had no choice but to be a part of and now that he had defeated the enemy and saved the wizarding world he felt as though he was losing the only family he had.

"We look after her, whether she wants us to or not, even when she pushes us away and is cruel to us because she will be, she won't mean it but she'll be angry and frustrated and we hope it is temporary," Bill tells them and they nod moving towards the healer who has just walked away from her bed.

"What's going on?" Charlie asks after a tense moment of silence as the healer jots something down on his notepad.

"She is still healing and so we won't know the full extent of the damage for another couple of weeks. We can't find anything on the scans, they show that everything is okay with her back, that her spinal cord is undamaged but she definitely has no feeling below her waist, the tests have proved that. At this stage we can only assume it is something to do with her brain rather than her spine and if that is the case there is no telling when or if she will recover the use of her legs," he explains and Harry hangs his head in despair even as Charlie clings to any hope he can.

"So what do we do?" Charlie asks after another moments pause and the healer looks up with a weary smile, he had seen a lot of death these last few days, so much pain, so much worthless loss of people far too young and he was tired, so bone achingly tired and emotionally drained from it that he hoped that Miss Sasha Greening would recover, that along with those like the boy who had saved them all, who stood broken before him now, would restore some hope and joy to the world.

"Take her home, keep her on bed rest for the next week and then when she is fully healed physically, begin to try and get her moving her legs and walking again, we'll revisit in a month or so and check on progress," the healer explains before making his excuses and rushing off to continue his rounds and console more distraught families.

"Come on then," Bill says gently guiding the other two towards Sasha's bed and rounding the corner they, all three, have to steal themselves at the look of fear and pain that she was trying so hard to keep off her face for their sakes.