Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.

Author's Note

At the end of HBP, Minerva was holding up remarkably well in the face of Dumbledore's sudden death. Once the shock wore off, I doubt it stayed that easy for her.

"Albus!"

Minerva clawed her way upright in bed. Someone was here, someone had shrieked that name, where was her wand, her wand -

"Lumos," she hissed, thrusting the slender shaft out at arm's length. Her throat felt full of barbed wire and broken glass, and as she stared around in the eerie glow she had conjured, she realized why. There was no intruder. The scream had come from her own mouth. It had not been the first, either, but only the one that had finally woken her. People were going to think she had gone mad, locked away in her bedroom and screaming in her sleep.

Maybe I have gone mad, she thought. With shaking hands, she snuffed out the wandlight and passed her wand over the fat pillar candles on her bedside table instead. Their wicks hissed and burst into flame, bathing the room and all its contents in a warm glow: the framed cross-stitch on the wall; the little wind-up clock with its gilt trim nearly rubbed off; the books in their worn leather covers; all of it friendly and familiar and utterly without comfort. What good were things when a hole had been torn in the very substance of the world, a void created that would never be filled? What did anything matter when everything was lost?

Minerva lay down again and pressed her palms to her eyes. She didn't want to cry anymore - she'd done so much of that in the last two days that her chest ached and her face felt perpetually hot and swollen - but it was hard when she kept coming back to the dreadful gap where Albus ought to have been. There was no escaping it. She had been trying to carry on as if he had only gone away on one of his journeys and left her in charge, as he had done so often, but she could not truly believe in the fantasy. It was all a sham, just like her new title. In all her years as Deputy Headmistress, she had never been more than a temporary substitute: someone to act according to Albus' wishes in his absence. She was not sure she was cut out to be more. And now Albus had not only left her this way, in a position she had neither asked for nor truly aspired to, but he had done it without giving her any instructions to follow. Whatever he had said before he died, he had said to Potter, and Harry was not telling. She envied him in a way. He knew what he had to do; she could see it in his eyes, and though it must be terrible, she thought she would sell her soul for that sort of certainty.

At that moment, a loud crack split the silence in the room, and Minerva grabbed for her wand again, heart thudding against her ribs. When she saw that it was not, in fact, a devil come to make a deal with her, she sank back onto the pillows.

"Don't burst in on me that way," she said to the invading house-elf, drawing the bedcovers up around her shoulders for modesty's sake. "You frightened me half to death. What do you want?"

Dobby balanced on the carved footboard of her bed, swaying back and forth, regarding her very seriously.

"I is coming to see if you is all right, Professor," he said. "Winky is telling me she hears sounds from your room. She is thinking maybe it is Death Eaters in the castle again."

"It isn't," said Minerva shortly.

Dobby did not move. "Dobby is not thinking it is Death Eaters. Dobby is thinking it is bad dreams."

"What makes you think that?" asked Minerva. She wondered why she was bothering to continue this conversation, and realized with some surprise that it was because she didn't want Dobby to leave just yet. Apparently, at a time like this, even a house-elf's company was better than none.

"Dobby is having bad dreams too," said the elf, staring at her with a suspicious wetness in his great bulging eyes. "Dobby is not feeling happy since Professor Dumbledore is gone."

Minerva swallowed hard. "I know. I have been trying to -"

"You is doing a good job," Dobby assured her. "We elves is all glad you is here. We is ready to help you the way we helped Professor Dumbledore. You is our Headmistress now."

Perhaps not for long, Minerva thought. It wouldn't be prudent to let that get back to the kitchens, though. If Hogwarts closed, as she was now almost certain it would, the house-elves would all be set free. While Dobby would be over the moon to hear it, the rest of them would panic. Better not to worry them before she had to. The last thing she needed was a pack of house-elves following at her heels, pleading to be allowed to keep their jobs, or worse, for her to take them home with her.

Home? What home? The idea made her shiver. Hogwarts had been her home for decades; she stayed here through the winter holidays and traveled most of the summer, never bothering to keep a separate residence the way some of her colleagues did. Without the castle, she would be as homeless as a freed house-elf. She imagined herself living in a flat somewhere with Hagrid and Filch, and choked, halfway between hysterical laughter and fresh tears.

Dobby, seeing that something was wrong, immediately leapt into full caretaking mode. "You's cold, Professor? Dobby will build up the fire ... get you more blankets ... hot soup ..."

"No," said Minerva hastily. "No, I'm quite all right. You may go now."

The elf paid no attention. "Something else then. Drink of water? Cup of tea? Warm socks? Professor Dumbledore liked socks, he had so many ..."

And that was all it took. After all her struggles to stay calm, she was completely undone by the memory of Albus and his ridiculous socks: all the times he had gone on about them, and the way he had shown off each garish new pair as if it were a priceless treasure. He was gone, and she would never hear him talk about socks again, or anything else, and it was all more than she could bear. She buried her face in the crisp linen pillowcase and wept bitterly, childishly, while Dobby squeaked in dismay and tried to pat her on the back. She could not catch her breath long enough to tell him again to go away, and at last she began drifting toward unconsciousness, still hiccupping and sobbing, with Dobby's little voice babbling reassurance and his spidery fingers twisted in her hair.

I hate being the Headmistress, she thought, and slept.