You touched your bruised face, feeling some liquid stain your fingers and hands. It was blood, blood that resulted in all of the cuts. It stung horribly and you rubbed some of the blood on your clothes. As you were still hiding behind a bush, your legs started to get numb, going down to your feet. Your feet had a numb tingle and you slapped them repeatedly to help blood circulate through it. You were lost, hungry and concerned about everything. You didn't know what to do. You couldn't just go back to the tent because you feared that someone might follow you back to it. You couldn't stay hidden either because someone might grab you and you won't know about your friends anymore. You were stuck and there was no way out of it. You thought of the weight that was on your back, it was your bag, and you remembered that you can safely store your wand.
You slowly held your bag in front of you and opened it slowly. You reached into it and placed your wand inside. It was safe to keep it there since there won't be a replacement anytime soon. You zipped it up and sat down once you were sure that there isn't anything else you can do. The snow bled through your pants and you winced but didn't utter a sound. You looked up into the sky, feeling your eyes start to feel heavy, threatening to close and make you drift to sleep. You thought about it but decided not to. It wasn't promised that you will wake up right where you are so, you weren't going to sleep even if your body was screaming at you to do so.
The clouds moved in the sky, blessing you with some direct light from the moon. The first thing that you did was glance at your arms. There were horrible gashes and dry blood all over them. Some even still had fresh blood dripping to the sides of your arms, making their way to the snow next to you. You wondered how they didn't hurt but you figured it was by the adrenaline still pumping in your veins. You grabbed some snow from the ground with your shaky hands and even though it was freezing, you rubbed it on your cuts. You flinched but it helped to ease some of the blood flow. The cold added to the numbness and once you were freezing from head to toe, you nervously picked at your lips.
There has to be someway you can get out of this. You have to go back to them but how? You can't use magic and you don't even know the direction to go back to the tent. Hopeless and hungry and tired, you felt useless and started to feel your eyes water. You hurriedly rubbed your eyes to not make yourself cry, you didn't want to add to the stress.
Merlin's beard, I don't know what to do. Can someone give me a sign? You thought, gazing at the night sky above you. As if the universe heard you, something caught your eye at your peripheral vision. As you squinted, not used to the light anymore, a figure that looked like a blue animal started to come towards you. You thought you were starting to hallucinate and after the blue blur started to get even closer, you realized that you weren't at all, but it is in fact an animal. You facepalmed yourself instinctively and muttered a grunt as it hurt you painfully. You couldn't believe what risk Harry was doing to send you his Patronus but you mentally thanked him for it. The stag pranced around you in a circle and you smiled at its beauty, ignoring the panic that was growing in your chest. The stag bowed its head in front of you and you placed your hand in between its tall horns. It stood upright again and started to prance back to where it came from. Was it telling you to follow it? You hurriedly got up and tumbled over a few feet of snow. Your head felt heavy and you stood waiting for the blood flow to get all the way to your feet. After you felt better, you hurriedly chased after it, making sure to keep your head ducked down, and traveled carefully through the forest, not letting it leave your sight. It started to run and you feared that it was hurrying because someone was there. You couldn't risk letting it go, your only way to get back to your friends, so you ran after it. Your legs were tired but it didn't let you down. The glow that trailed behind it, shined a few feet in front of you. You were able to see better and didn't harm yourself to much. A couple of moments of running, you panted heavily but the stag kept on running and running. The trees were starting to sparse and you hoped that the tent was near. A couple of more feet and there was the tent right ahead of you. You smiled as you saw a body outside the familiar tent and you decided to catch your breath. You slowed down as you saw the stag disappear in front of a person with bushy brown hair. You strained your eyes and you felt a great sense of relief as you realized it was Hermione. You hurriedly rubbed your arms on your clothes to hide some of the horrible gashes on them to not scare her.
You walked to the far end of the forest and Hermione squinted to see who you were. Once she saw it was you, she ran towards you, knowing that you must have traveled far already. She wrapped her arms around your neck and you hugged her back. She cried and you smiled holding her head protectively.
"I heard something in the forest and I thought it was- Oh my, y/n, are you okay?" Hermione asked, still not letting you go.
"I'm fine, Hermione," you whispered, breathing heavily. You held her close because she added to the warmth that you needed. She still hasn't let you go. You were appreciating having a hug from your best friend, making the night in the forest worth it.
She released you from her grasp and she gasped at your face and arms. Her eyes started to tear and she whispered, "Oh, no. I am so sorry." She wiped tears off her face and she felt horrible to see you like that. You mouthed 'its okay' and started to rub your hands together to seek some heat. While you were busy doing that, somewhere behind Hermione, Ron sneaked around the tent to see what was taking Hermione so long to get back. He saw you and his eyes widened.
"Y/n?" He asked, opening his arm to you. He jogged a little bit and you smiled as he gave you a side hug and you hugged him back. He apologized many times for leaving you in the forest and you said, "It's okay, Ron. I told you to do it."
"What's taking you both so long?" Harry asked, throwing a stick on the snow. His voice was distant but you smiled as you knew it was him. He hasn't seen you yet because Hermione and Ron were covering your view of him. Ron moved to the side and your eyes met Harry's. His mouth fell open and the both of you started to run towards each other. He smiled and he let you reach for his neck. You wrapped your arms around him and he wrapped them around your back. The both of you didn't say anything at all, just living in the moment of having each other in each other's arms. He held your head and you smiled onto his neck.
"I told you not to miss me," you mumbled on his sweater.
He released you a little bit while chuckling. Like if he barely realized you were there he asked, "How are you so calm after you were there? Wait- How did you come back here?" He looked around the forest for any intruders and you shrugged your shoulders. "A blue stag came up to me and let me go after it which leads us to here," you replied, smiling.
"I told you not do that, Harry. What if someone else would've followed it as well?" Hermione said as she turned her head to look around the forest surrounding you four. Ron did as well and he tensed as he did so. When there was no sound or movement at all, they both relaxed and fixed their gaze on you and Harry.
You still haven't let go of Harry and neither of you wanted to let go of each other. Your adrenaline was starting to wear off and the freezing cold hit you. You shivered and had to let go of Harry even though he was supplying you with so much warmth. Harry grinned and he took off his sweater right away. "Here, you're cold and its my turn to give you a sweater. You're probably freezing," he said, helping you get in his sweater by putting it over your head. You put your arms through the sleeves and he untucked your hair that was under the neckline. His soft touch made you shiver a little bit but you blamed it on the cold, not like they would ask you why you shivered anyways. The type of material his sweater was made of scratched on your scars, making it even more itchy. You put your sleeves up and folded them on your elbows. His face alarmed as he suddenly realized that you had cuts and gashes all over your arms and face.
"Oh my... Y/n. Your arms," Harry said, tracing his fingers through them. You let him stare at your arms and he did something that you weren't expecting him to do. He raised your arms to his lips and he kissed both of them. You stood in shock but you thought it was something he did because he cared for you like a friend. He looked back up and he smiled at you. Hermione and Ron looked at each other and looked back at the both of you, the same thoughts came through both of their minds: He fancies Y/n.
"I-uh, we should head back inside," you said, smiling nervously. You turned back to look at your friends who have been oddly quiet and the four of you headed inside to settle down. The first thing you did was plop on a chair and you rested your head on a little table that was right beside it. You breathed heavily and saw the table fog up with each breath. The heat of the sweater and being inside the tent, made you relieved and brought you a little headache. Hermione and Ron grabbed extra clothes and put them over you. You started to sweat uncontrollably when they placed more clothes on you. "What's happening? Why am I shaking?" You asked as your teeth chattered against each other, causing you pain on your jaw.
"You're probably catching a cold or getting sick," Hermione said, putting a comforting hand on your back. "You stayed out in the snow for a long time and you weren't entirely covered. I don't know why else you can be shaking."
You rubbed your hands together to make it heat up. As you did so, you remembered what you did in the forest. You closed your eyes in disapproval and Ron said, "Oh no, that's your 'I did something really stupid' face." You let out a small chuckle and said, "I may or may not have rubbed snow on my arms."
"You what?!" Hermione exclaimed. She looked at you as if you were mad and asked, "Why would you do that?"
You examined your arms and said, "I was running through the forest and I had to hide. But, there were sticks and branches that were scratching my arms and face as I ran. There wasn't any light so I expected I would get hurt. I finally managed to hide behind a bush and I got the brilliant idea to put snow over the cuts to ease the blood flow. I didn't know what else to do. I panicked."
"You have to tell us everything that happened," Harry said, moving a chair to sit around you. Hermione and Ron stood but they looked sternly at you as if ready to prepare for the worst.
You shivered a couple more times and Ron brought the fire lamp that they had. You thanked him with your smile and said, once you've warmed up, "It's a long and silly story really so, get comfortable."