Behind My Fortress of Silence and Books...

Salem was sitting at a table in a small nook of the library where she could be easily forgotten, or ignored at the very least, her nose in a book. Books were stacked around her, a fortress of knowledge that shielded her from the ignorant cruelty of the outside world, key being the prying eyes of snobby teenaged witches who always seemed to want to peer at Salem.

Oh, looky, a girl who is strange. Let's put her in cage and goggle at her, why don't we.

Salem withheld from sighing to herself. She was becoming rather snide, even if the dialogue was not verbal. That was the problem with being alone. After awhile, it makes it harder to look pleasantly upon other people, since they just do not belong to your world. Salem forced the sarcastic thoughts from her head, knowing only she had to suffer through them, and tried to recenter upon her usual tranquil and pensive demeanor that suited her so well.

She was surrounded by books focusing on plants and animals. Usually, Salem preferred anything fictitious, but the Hogwarts library did not have too great of a selection on works of fiction. And until she found her way to a bookshop, Salem would have to make due with what she had here. Reading about animals and plants came as a pleasant reminder of the better things in life. Salem understood the quiet, gentile nature of plants. And animals had an innocence that she came to deeply respect and revere.

Either way, she was more than content where she was. For one of the first times is awhile, she was able to allow a neutral expression onto her face, as opposed to her usually terrified countenance. It was not that she was weak of heart; Salem had a pretty strong resolve, all considering. The demands people tended to put on her, though, really threw her off balance. She often felt like she was an actor that was ushered onto stage at the wrong time. Obviously, such a constant feeling of tumultuous uncertainty was bound to have an effect on a person.

And so the slight, young girl continued to pour through the books, finding the innocent pleasure of digesting intriguing knowledge quite the lovely past time. She had usually avoided becoming a regular in any place, so that she would not be forced to be recognized with any specific place or person or thing, but she found herself thinking that she definitely could find this library to be a very lovely shelter.

Flip… tap, tap, tap… flip… tap, tap, tap, Nerissa stared down at the worn pieces of paper, all sewn together, bound by a thin black thread and a leather spine. Words were scattered about the page with rips at its edges, words that Nerissa couldn’t seem to make sense of; her brain seemed to see each individual letter as if it were spaced out miles apart from the next, and she couldn’t seem to glue them all together long enough to read the page and continue on to the next. So she flipped the pages, drumming her fingers rapidly along the splintered surface of the library table she was sitting at, before gazing at the page for a few moments unblinkingly, and then flipping the page once more. It seemed like a useless process, but for some reason, it made her feel as if she was actually getting something done. Flip… tap, tap, tap… flip… tap, tap, tap At least the sound of the turning pages sounded pleasant to here ears. Homework… she had homework to do didn’t she? What was she doing, sitting there reading about whatever she pleased?

Hiding, she decided. She was hiding from the students with their curious ears and their constant streams of questions. Nerissa didn’t like them much, for she found it extremely difficult to relate to them; to understand what it was that made these teenagers act the ways they did- but then again, she herself was a rather strange being, wasn’t she? Wasn’t she the one reading a book, without reading it, in the corner of a library on a sunny day.

Nerissa’s dull eyes flickered in the direction of the window; she hadn’t been paying much attention to the weather, but at the thought of it, if it were actually as sunny as she had assumed, perhaps locking herself in the Greenhouse would be a much better place to hide than the dusty old library. The young redhead sat up a bit straighter in her wooden chair, looking past her reflection on the windowpane to gaze momentarily at the grounds miles below. People were flying about on their broomsticks, tossing quaffles back and forth, laughing… Nerissa propped her chin atop the heel of her palm; suddenly, going outside to listen to the voices and the laughter didn’t sound too bad… perhaps they would leave her alone to lie in the grass and bathe in the last of the day’s sun.

She was tempted, and had almost given in- until she had gazed back down at her book, and she had remembered that she had homework to do, and that teenagers asked questions that Nerissa didn’t like to answer whenever she got too near… She rested her head against the cold tabletop, only just noticing the throbbing pain beneath her skull. The headaches still hadn’t stopped. It had been over a year since the incident when she had nearly drowned in the black lake, and yet, the pain continued.

The young redhead inhaled, raising her head slowly, allowing it to hover a few inches above the table’s surface for a moment, “Now, I cant do homework with a headache,” Nerissa muttered with a scowl on her face, brushing her tousled bangs away from her face, “I wonder if there is a potion for that- there has to be. There is a potion for everything- plants, now plants would help with that…” she spoke to herself, assuming that she was completely alone- other than the librarian, who shushed her whenever her voice became a little too loud. Nerissa closed the book she had already spent an hour ‘reading’ and stood from her chair, beginning her search for a new book, one on potions and herbs for pain.

Salem was noticing something that made her feel slightly smug with pride, but also rather weary and lonesome. The stacks of books she had yet to read were becoming far and fewer, and the books she had skimmed through and perused enough were growing in number, making her small little book fort look rather lopsided. Attention, troops, our north side is unprotected...

She sighed to herself. Yes, the more lonely and bored she became, the likelihood of her thinking snide increased. This was the main reason she knew it was unhealthy for her to be alone. She hated to admit it, but when she was honest with herself, she knew that it was not a good thing. She did not like to be left to her thoughts when she got in these moods. You knew you were getting irritable when you could not even stand to be around yourself.

She reached out a hand and a finger traveled down the spines of the smallest stack, the only testament to the knowledge she had yet to learn. A few interesting titles, but the fact remained that she needed her fortress back. It would not do to be umprotected on one side, and unable to see over the other wall...

She stood and her arms fastened around the bottom of the large stack of books she had already had her fill with. Her chin slipped over the top of the topmost book and she waddled towards a shelf where she knew a few of the books belonged. She stumbled slightly and rested the stack against a shelf, leaning against it.

She reached up and slipped the top book into a crevice in the collection of books, knowing that was its proper spot. She slid the stack along the shelf, sidestepping with it, before returning another book. She began to continue and suddenly, her shoulder collided something that was neither book, nor shelf, nor librarian.

Salem let out a jumped slightly, her mountain of books wobbling madly, a tower of books about to collapse. She stumbled and managed to keep the leaning tower of books from completely collapsing. She grabbed a few books and quickly stuffed them onto the shelf to relieve her quivering arms. She looked at the girl and gave her an apologetic look, unable to communicate her apologies any better.

Thousands of different titles scribbled upon the spines of books sitting along the Library’s many wooden shelves made up a sea of letters that flooded Nerissa’s mind after only a few seconds of skimming over them, running her fingers along their smooth paper and leather skins. Her eyes ran quickly over each spine, searching for something- anything that would give her some sort of hint that the book that these titles belonged to, would have some sort of remedies for her inside; some sort of cure for the sharp, stabbing pain she was experiencing, that just refused to go away. Nerissa shook her head, sending small particles of gold dust dancing about her face, leaping off of the bookshelves at the opportunity to come in contact with the flame-red hair that sat atop her head.

“Potion…” Nerissa began to read aloud a word that she had been searching for from the black, speckled spine of a book hiding a bit further back on the shelves than the rest of the books, as if humbled by its age- but the young female’s thoughts were interrupted by a rough shove, which she received from a female she hadn’t known had been present in the first place.

The redhead fell forward, finding out for herself just how good the quality of the wood that the shelves were made of was when her already aching head smashed into it painfully. Skull collided with wood with an almost comical clunk!, fallowed by a squeal, which, despite Nerissa’s greatest attempts, had managed to escape her dried lips as a signal that yes, she had indeed felt pain- but who was the cause of this? The paranoid mouse of a girl in the back of Nerissa’s head that always knew just when to speak up seemed to get a kick out of mentioning that there was a possibility that this female had been sent by Ne’Os to torture her- to finish what he had started before he had died.

Nerissa slowly sat down on the carpeted floors of the Library, clutching her head, which had produced the normal amount of warm, sticky blood for such an injury, and glanced at the person who had condemned her to death; a girl- a girl with black hair and raccoon rings around her eyes. She wore an apologetic expression upon her face, Nerissa noticed, which was not usually an expression that persecutors wore.

Just as slowly as the young redhead had taken a seat on the floor, she opened her mouth and began to form words in her throat, though her heart hammered, almost refusing to allow her voice to work; It was a fact of life- of, Nerissa’s life- that she would get hurt by people, whether it be accidental or intentional, was it not? “Nerissa Hatts. I have a headache- well, I did even before this. I’m looking for a book on potions for pain.” Nerissa Hatts didn’t relate well with children her age; she did not like the way they acted and the questions they asked, but Nerissa saw no harm in allowing one of them to help her.

Salem's eyes widened with horror as the girl flung forward and her head hit the bookshelf, making a loud noise that seemed to echo in the library and rebound in her ears. The tiniest of gasps escaped her lips and she jerked forward, but the girl was already sitting up, clutching her head in pain, a grimace on her face.

Salem got a glimpse of the girls hand and saw red coating her hand. The color drained form Salem's face and she shook slightly. That was it, she had killed this girl. She opened her mouth but, of course, no words came out and she firmly closed it, trying to force the terrified expression off of her face.

The girl introduced herself and Salem shook slightly at how calm she was. Salem scrambled for her bag and yanked out a scrap of parchment and a muggle fountain pen, quickly scrawling. I am so sorry Nerissa! Please, let me heal you, or at least take you to the hospital wing. She pulled out her wand to demonstrate that she was more than willing to assist her, a concerned look on her face.

Salem was rather brilliant if she applied herself, but she usually did not since that required drawing attention to herself. She was not sure Episkey would work on Nerissa's head wound, but she hoped it would at least abate it, and besides; she had a pretty powerful Episkey, if she was honest. She crouched down next to the girl, her eyes still wide.

The reaction that Nerissa had seen from the girl with the raccoon eyes, it seemed sincere, but everybody lied, and some people were better at lying than the rest. The girl dug a piece of parchment out of her bag and began to scribble letters upon it, allowing Nerissa to sit there, clutching her head with a pained-yet-puzzled expression as she watched the other female as closely as an expectant cop would watched a suspect.

“What are you doing…” Nerissa’s lips moved and her voice produced sound, but she had not commanded either to do anything; she was on autopilot as she dealt with the pain that was pulsing through her skull like a nail being pounded into her head- not to mention the confusion that was working her brain over. The raccoon, she had finished scribbling letters, and had held the piece of paper before Nerissa’s face, but she was having the same problem as before…

The smoothly shaped letters written in thick, black ink upon the yellow-white paper meant nothing to her. Nerissa ran her eyes over them quickly, attempting to retain the information that she was sure that her brain was being fed- but like a short in a circuit, something fizzled within her mind and the connection was lost. “I can’t… not when my- headache,” Nerissa tried to explain, blinking. The sun that had been shining brilliantly through the window was now peeking at Nerissa through a slit in-between two books on the shelf, a single ray hitting her directly in the eye- the young female turned her head away, wincing. The sudden movement had only caused dizziness- like a chain reaction.

Out of the corner of her dead eyes, Nerissa spotted the sleek wood of a wand which the raccoon girl held in her hands, “Yes, use a charm- b-b-but only if you know how,” she stuttered; her bravery from before had left her, and it was now painfully clear just how nervous the idea of having a wand pointed at her forehead made her feel.

She doesn’t talk! Ne’Os sent her to finish you off! Why doesn’t she speak? She was told not to speak to you because it would make the job easier! Simple. It is simple- but it is not simple. It is never simple when it involves Ne’Os, for he is a complicated prat- no! Don’t think like that he will hear you! the mouse screamed, cowering at the back of Nerissa’s mind in the darkest of shadows, warmed by the blood that fed the brain, which keept it alive like gasoline in a car’s engine.

Nerissa groaned; her thoughts were becoming too noisy again, much too noisy- the last time they had been such a burden had been the year prior, when she had had thoughts of running away to America- she had even attempted it, and had that Gryffindor not intervened she would have gotten away with it. The paranoia, it had left her for a good amount of time, but it did return- oh yes, it did return- but only when she was around others, or when the headaches were particularly bad.

With both combined, it was no wonder the little paranoid mouse was trembling.

“E-episky!” the young female insisted, once again having trouble with her words. She’s gonna hurt me- don’t let her hurt me! Nerissa pressed her palm flat against the wound, hoping to somehow stop the stinging sensation that she experienced every time air licked the skin there. Her eyes once again flickered in the direction of the girl’s face, wondering what sort of expression she would find there- and it was the mouse that had expected amusement upon the other girl’s face, but Nerissa found only deep concern, “I’ll be fine…” she spoke, but her words sounded distant, as if she were reassuring someone in a far-off land, rather than the mute before her.

Hadn't Nerissa been so convinced that she could accept the fact that people hurt her often? Then again, things never worked out the way people were convinced they would.

As Nerissa's eyes went to the paper, Salem's eyes went to the girls, trying to see what she would find there, desperate to know she had not hurt the girl too badly. She felt her heart plummet as she saw the girl's eyes focus and unfocus on the paper and she mumbled something about not being able to read it because of the headache.

Salem's heart pounded with terror. She would have to talk. Her only means of communication besides speaking was useless. The girl could not focus. Salem opened her mouth and her throat closed... It was always when she needed to speak most that it became the most impossible. It was the disorder's fault... A nervous disorder that caused muteness was never kind. Whenever she needed it most was when she was most on edge, therefore speech seemed untouchable.

Somehow the girl understood and the girl stuttered out permission for Salem to heal her. Salem's heart was filled with thankfulness and relief, as the subtle quaking in her arms and legs subsided. She turned her wand over in her hand, hearing the girl mutter episkey. Salem had known it but she could see the girl was nervous about Salem healing her. Had Salem been in her place, she would have been terrified. Heck, she was already terrified.

The girl defensively put her hand against the wound and insisted that she would be fine, but Salem's eyes locked on hers and she earnestly shook her head, as though to say Nerissa needed Salem's help. Salem carefully aimed at a revealed spot and thought with all her might Episkey!

It was a good thing Salem had mastered nonverbal magic, especially because a whispered spell had very little power. Salem was relieved to see the wound begin to shrink, though she could not see if it had completely healed because Nerissa's hand was almost completely covering the epicenter of her wound. She stared at Nerissa, a question in her eyes, obviously asking if she was alright.

OOC: My mistake, I must have had convinced my mind into falsely remembering that Salem had taken out her wand.

There was something about a sudden, quickened heartbeat that always made Nerissa feel as if she were about to vomit. Perhaps the thrill of the moment- the extra adrenaline that had surely been pumped into her blood- was too much for the usual calm and cautious young female to handle.

She could feel her heart throbbing beneath her ribcage, rattling her about like a windup toy on the carpeted floors of the Library as the tip of another student’s wand was held only inches before the skin of her forehead. No go, no go, no go! Mouse whimpered, clutching at the edges of Nerissa’s brain, small tears rolling down its silver whiskers. “C-careful you!” the Mouse was started to get to Nerissa, that much was clear with the way she stuttered hopelessly, clutching at her bleeding head with her spine pressed firmly up against the wooden bookshelves that could have been blamed quite a deal for her injury.

No words were uttered, no incantation; nothing but a simple flick of a wand that would solve the chaos that had been created so very easily as the other child healed the wound that had been the cause of Nerissa’s sudden paranoia. The task of healing an injury was rather simple for anyone who had paid attention during their Charms lessons, but had Nerissa injured herself, it would have been as easy as threading her own lips shut. She had someone to help her, she reminded herself- but then again, had this other student never arrived, Nerissa wouldn’t have found herself in such a situation. “Easy come, easy go,” Nerissa whispered her thoughts aloud, earning a few shrieks from The Mouse No go! No Go! The poor thing seemed very convinced that Nerissa Hatts was dying on that very day due to a head injury, which had been caused by… book shelves.

There was a prickling sensation in the heart of the wound, fallowed by a throbbing sensation which then ran further into her skull, deeper into her head until it became one with the pounding headache she had already been experiencing, creating an even more painful headache, but taking away from the pain of the injury upon her forehead.

The small female slowly moved her shaking fingers away from her bloodied wound upon the instructions that she had received through the other girl’s eyes- she seemed quite skilled at communicating through eyes, despite the fact that it was quite difficult to see them through all the black eyeliner. She wasn’t a supporter of Ne’Os, sent to finish Nerissa off because Ne’Os had been killed before he had been able to do so himself… she spoke through her eyes, and that was not the story her irises told. She was forgiven, and Nerissa was also grateful towards her for her healing spell.

Blood had already begun caking to the skin of Nerissa’s long, slender fingers- a color that contrasted oddly with her paled skin. “I-is it- is it OK now? I’m alright? I’m alright. I’m fine,” Nerissa spoke, her voice slowly regaining strength as she continued on, though her body seemed to be drained from all energy. She reclined backwards, allowing her limbs to drape along the nearest row of books using the spines as armrests in a way that made her look quite similar to a dead starfish. “I’m fine. Thank you. You don’t talk, why is that?- but I can’t read yet, not until my headache leaves me be,” she spoke, though conversation was meaningless to her; all she cared for was the sun that was warming the skin of her newly healed forehead. The Mouse had quieted by then much to her relief, leaving her to wonder who the girl with raccoon-ringed eyes was.

Nerissa groaned abruptly, her heartbeat had slowed remarkably, but her stomach felt as if she had just boarded the world’s largest rollercoaster- and with a quick turn of her head and a flash of brilliant red hair, Nerissa gave up her lunch to the peacock colored carpet.

OOC: Quite a bit more was edited in, just a heads up.

((Eh... It might have been... my brain has not really been working...))

Salem heard the girl murmuring her discomfort and nervousness as she healed her, but once she moved her hand, Salem saw that the wound had closed up, though her head was still caked in blood and she was sure to have a killer headache which, by the sounds of it, was already a small demon of the girls so she probably was rather irritated with Salem at the moment. Salem quickly cast a siphoning charm and she saw that some of the blood had disappeared off the girl's skull.

Salem was still shaking slightly and she slowly lowered her wand before tucking it into her pocket and she cocked her head to further examine the side of Nerissa's head that had been attacked by the combined forces of the bookshelf and Salem. She relaxed slightly and she let out a sigh of relief, mopping back her hair and shaking her head. She was pretty sure it was completely healed and Salem had not hurt her permanently... Nerissa asked if she was okay and Salem nodded in confirmation.

Nerissa began to mumble about something and Salem heard a question about why she did not speak, and then she said that she could not read anything. Again, Salem's only means of communication. She scrawled I can't... I'm Salem... on the paper and slipped it to Nerissa, though she shrugged in case Nerissa indeed could not read what she had written. Salem never knew how to explain her disorder, so she usually avoided the subject. However, she sort of owed this girl... Dilemmas...

It took Nerissa quite a deal of time to recover- as if she had been punched in the stomach, rather than shoved into a bookcase. Her fingers crawled slowly upward until at last her hands sat upon her stomach, “Ugh…” she groaned, clutching her gut, her face hovering only a few inches above the floor, not a thought of movement crossing her mind; all life, all energy had been pulled from her completely, leaving her feeble and pointless on the floor of the Library deep within the heart of Hogwarts, where no one other than the girl wearing eyeliner knew she was, “Not my Jell-O…” she added, having glanced at the small mess that she had created, it sharing the same color as her favorite, full-of-preservatives treat, which she couldn’t seem to go a single day without.

The young Ravenclaw flattened her palm against the nearest, clean spot of carpet that she could find, and she steadied herself with her hand, curling her fingers into the carpet until she was sure that she had a good hold; the last thing Nerissa needed was to stumble over after all that had already happened, due to the sudden stress she had been put under.

Slowly, Nerissa brought the end of the sleeve of her overlarge, blue, plaid shirt, which she had decided to wear as a sweater, to the corner of her mouth, slowly dragging it from one end of her lips to the other in order to rid them of the vomit that had clung to them- a disgusting, yet necessary process after an incident such as the one Nerissa had been forced to endure, “That’s disgusting- I’d apologize, but I really didn’t see it coming myself,” she spoke slowly, her voice sounding quite similar to that of a frog’s croak- which was much unlike her usual, soft and broken tone of voice.

Nerissa averted her gaze from the vomit which she would eventually find herself with no option other than to clean from the carpet, to stare at the piece of yellowing parchment that the female before her had scribbled several letters upon in a deep, black ink- a single word she could make out, a word that could be nothing other than the name of the girl with the raccoon-like qualities about her- Salem.

Communication was an odd thing, it truly was; it was a tool that had gotten human beings so very far, and without it, Nerissa couldn’t imagine them with anything to their names other than the skin they were born with upon their bones. The ability to transfer information from one person to the next was one of the most important things known to mankind, and yet, it was such a fragile thing; it depended on the understanding of a language, the ability to speak the words required, the ability to hear the words that are spoken, the ability to read and write the words needed to communicate upon a piece of paper, and last, the speaking of words through one’s eyes… the last two of the many options seemed to be the only left between the pair of young females, who sat within the library- two different, odd young females.

“Salem. I read that part,” Nerissa spoke, as if to reassure her in a way, before sighing deeply, curling her fingers around two planks of wood that made up the shelves that Nerissa had accidentally run her head into only moments prior, making sure that she put all her strangth in to it as she did so, “Up we get,” the redhead muttered quietly, heaving herself up from the floor until she was once again standing upon her feet- and after a few moments of getting used to standing straight once again, she had managed to make herself look somewhat put together despite the events of the previous five-or-so minutes. “…and I’ll have to clean that up, of course,” she mentioned while exhaling, nodding in the general direction of the spot on the floor near her foot.