Journey to the Edge of a Rhinestone Reality

Disclaimer: The Harry Potter universe (inclusive of Hogwarts School, all recognizable characters mentioned, all institutions, situations, events and happenings) is copyrighted by author J.K. Rowling and her corporate affiliates. The following work is fan fiction and is considered by the author to be a respectful parody of Ms. Rowling's work while acknowledging it's derivative status. No commercial use of this work is intended nor is any revenue being made from it or any website which it may be archived on.

A/N. This is an answer to Tegan's WIKTT Second Person Challenge and was hellish to write, keeping in 2nd person with a strict word limit. Thanks for the challenge, Tegan. Thanks to Lily and Des for reading this through. Written 10.4.03. This was written well before we had any idea who the Lady might be, thus it's AU now.

Ever the Lady

You are ever the lady as you were taught to be, aren't you? Always moving gracefully, but no one can see how sometimes you'd like to bolt and flit through the castle. That would destroy the image, though, wouldn't it? Your robes were made for slow, ladylike swishing through castle halls, not for dashing about with skirts tugged up around your thighs, chasing after butterflies like a young girl. But you grew up, didn't you? No longer laughing and chattering or giving opinions on politics. Ladies don't speak loudly - in fact, you never speak at all. Does anyone know why? Do you? Yes, of course you do. It was him, the man, the one.

He married you, so many hundreds of years ago. When was it? 1700? 1600? 1500? No, even before that. It was a time when all a woman had were home and God, no matter how intelligent she was. He was a knight, distantly related to your mother. You were only a young girl when your father summoned you into his parlor in that old hall. He told you that the knight was now a Baron and was going to marry you when you turned sixteen and then you would be moving to the border where the King had given him lands to hold and protect.

The sweet, dotty lady that you called "Mother" leaned in, took your hand and said that you would need to stop reading so much and stop practicing charms to summon butterflies and rainbows and start learning to keep a home. After all, you would be chatelaine of a manse that might one day receive the King. She said that tomorrow you were to start making the linens that would be a part of your dowry, the potter would begin on the dishes and the cooper would begin making eating utensils with his scraps. You would start learning cleaning charms and how to select the best herbs and how to gut a chicken, just in case the knight- the Baron - didn't yet have a cook.

So you did. You learned to cook and clean and embroider and weave and keep accounts and stand up straight and only speak when spoken to because that's what ladies did and when you were sixteen, you were ready and he came.

He was so old. As old as your father, but by then the butterfly-chasing girl had been worked out of you, you were a lady. Knowing your duty, you curtsied politely and didn't flinch when he kissed your hand and smiled graciously. Married two weeks later in the village church and whisked off on an old palfrey suited to a lady's sensibilities, you began a new life far away from home and hearth.

It didn't take long to settle in to the new household. They were desperate for a chatelaine and for an heir. The old man did his duty and you did yours. It wasn't a hard life, your husband was wealthy and the house, while draughty, was safe and the fireplaces didn't smoke unless it was raining. He didn't like chatter in his home though and didn't believe in a woman expressing an opinion different than her lord's. More than once he told you to hush, but you knew that he was right so you did. He had a cook, squire, even an elderly priest that had come with him from the Marches. It seemed that your husband was the religious sort even though many wizards weren't. In time, your belly grew round and heavy with child, but you bore up with strength and quiet dignity. The priest lent you all the books you wanted to read, even being so kind as to borrow some from the nearby abby. By the time the heir was born, you had read all of the books in your husband's house and half of the ones from the abby. The King died before he came for a visit and your husband mourned his loss but pledged his fealty to the next one. By the time you were twenty-five, you'd born the heir, a spare and a girl in the middle and managed not to die while you did it, one of your biggest fears.

The boys were wonderful and they grew so quickly. The eldest was already a squire to his father's first knight and the younger was already zooming about with a wooden sword, poking the dogs and his sister. His sister, what a joy she was. So sweet and pretty, with your blonde hair and deep gray eyes. She took to learning to read and ciphering far better than her brothers did; a clever girl she was. You taught her to read, the old priest taught the boys until he died and a new one was brought in from the abby. Your husband didn't care what you did, as long as it was out of the way.

The new priest. you started when you saw him, he was so handsome. Your breath caught in your throat and your heart raced when you kissed his hand. He wasn't old, only about thirty, but had all of his hair, though it was cut in a tonsure. He was tall; when he moved you could see that his robes covered a warrior's body, rather than a scholar's. He never told you to hush and never minded when you expressed a shy opinion. He liked talking about books and politics and poetry with you. Your eyes followed him when you were in the same room but you were stupid. While your eyes were following him - and indeed his were following you, another was watching you both.

Your husband was old and didn't like you but he was not stupid and you weren't nearly as subtle in your appreciation as you thought you were. You were a good wife, you took care of the house and accounts, never had you even thought of an affair - not even with the priest, but you watched him with the hunger that a whore watches a king with and never knew it.

You only went to him to borrow a book. The door swung shut from the wind, but you were alone with him. In his private quarters, not the chapel under the eyes of God. A maid told a squire, who told a knight and the knight told your husband that you had been there with the door closed. Already holding his sword from the practice field, he ran into the priest's room. You were sitting on a bench, discussing a passage from the Carmina Burana when he slammed the door open. He saw you there, you heads bent so close together. Then he charged, yelling of honor and infidelity.

It didn't hurt when he killed you. Just pressure on your chest when the sword entered your breast and sliced it's way out your back to lodge in the wooden wall behind you. Eyes wide, you stared at him. Your mouth opened to question, to beg, to scream, but there was only a small gasp of air; you died silently. The strength of the Baron's arm holding the sword held you up as you died. The last thought you had was of your children and the priest. You needed more, you wanted more - more time, more love. more. Then your body fell to the side, your eyes still open, blood seeped through the linen shift and woolen surcoat you wore. The cotehardie had no better luck. It was the same gray as your eyes, but now was blooming red.

You watched as the potter erected two gravestones behind the chapel; one was just beyond the fence. It felt like you were flying ten feet above him as he worked, wiping his running nose on his sleeve, tears dripping down his face. He was muttering something but you couldn't hear so you moved closer, not noticing that you were having to come down out of the air to do so - you only wanted to get closer. You didn't walk, you just . moved. You reached out to stroke his shoulder, silently offering comfort as the lady of the house is duty bound to do. He turned when he felt the bitter cold of your touch, saw you and screamed. He threw his shovel at you and dashed back into the bailey, yelling of ghosts and the walking dead. Confused and frightened, you looked after him then at your hand. Gone was the slender pale hand of before. In its place was a shadow- something that you could see through. You gave a soundless scream.

A priest came running out, not the same man from a week ago, but a new one, someone from the abby. His eyes grew wide and he clutched his wand and the crucifix hanging around his neck, holding up both to you. When you looked at this with silvery tears in your eyes, not moving, just floating, still in the breeze, he slowly lowered them.

"Do you know who you are," he asked.

You nodded, unable to speak for the tears.

"Do you know why you are here?" he asked, trying to remain calm.

You looked around, at the graves, marked only with crosses, then up at the children's window. You pointed to it and sobbed.

"I thought as much," he said. "My lady, you are a ghost, you're dead. He killed you."

You fled. You knew he was right but you fled across the fields, beyond the river, into the forest. There you stayed for time unknown. When you came out, you had collected yourself. You could move through objects, you could float, fly, soar - but chose not to do that as lifting too high from the ground exposed your chemise and everything underneath. You weren't crying anymore, but had found some kind of peace. And you still hadn't made a sound.

You went back to the manse, but it was different now. The house was made of stone, not wood and there were too many cotter's shacks and fences. The peasants wore different clothing now, too. Gone were surcoats, they wore fitted, laced things and horrid mobcaps. Even the language was different. It was hard to understand the vile mixture of English and French and Gaelic. Entering the house, you wandered through, careful to keep out of sight. This was not your family, these were not your children. Finally, you found a library and a Bible - your Bible. The last date on it was 1723, a birth. Nothing marked after that. Confused, you flipped paged to the last one you had written in. Your daughter's birth. No, you whispered silently. no. They were gone, all of them. For hundreds of years, they'd been gone. You looked for your name; you found it. It looked so cold written out in an ancient priest's hand. Just below it, two days later, was the name of your husband and murderer. Next to it was a small note that he was buried outside of the chapel's yard because he had committed suicide after murdering his wife and the family priest. You left the book where it was and floated out to the churchyard. There they were. The two markers you vaugely remember the potter placing. One with your name on decaying marble, the other with his on a similar one. You found the name of your eldest son. The others, you assumed had moved on and died elsewhere. Off to one side were the graves of the old family priests. His name was there, and the date. It was the same as yours. Nothing kept you here now. Nothing and no one.

So you left. Travelling mostly at night to avoid scaring people, something a lady would never do, even when feeling silly. You moved with your hands folded as a lady should. Your dress was gray - it had been one of your favorites. They must have buried you in it. It certainly had not been the one you died in.. Your senses were duller now, you could neither taste, nor smell, nor feel, but when you concentrated hard enough, you could sometimes pick up a book.

Without thought, you went north, for no other reason than to get away from the Borders. You wandered for several years, stopping in castles and abbies to read when you were tired, but never needing sleep. Once, you came across a pooka, who in his horse way told you of a castle to the northwest. Witches and wizards went to school and lived and died there. Since you were a witch when you were alive, perhaps - just perhaps they would be able to suggest something.

So you went there. To Hogwarts. Though you still don't speak, those who need to know your thoughts do. You don't flit through the corridors, but see it as a duty to show these young girls how to behave in a respectable, ladylike way. And you read - voraciously. They don't know your name, you never would tell, but they call you The Gray Lady.