Kate comes back.
The sun rises dully above the distant mountains, obscured by a thin haze of clouds that cling to the peaks like spun sugar, making the entire scene almost sickly sweet to Kate's feverish mind. Alone, she ponders almost absently if she'll die here, wrapped in an old woolen blanket, the last piece of old bread long ago crumbs in the bottom of a limp haversack.
"I'm done running, I guess."
A head too heavy from exhaustion falls forward on folded arms, and a shuddering sigh makes her too-thin frame seem to heave unnaturally. The sun falls out of her view, but her eyes are slow to dialate, reluctant to adjust to the dim undergrowth that she finds herself sitting in. Belatedly, she also realizes it's damp with dew.
Rising on shaky legs, her hands brush ineffectually at her wet trousers, then pause when she realizes she's just making things worse. She glances around, sees nothing new, looks down, then glances again. A nearby tree gives slightly as she stumbles against it... and she's moving again.
She'd left Hogwarts what... five months ago? It had been a whim - almost a concession to herself that she was still willing to run rather than face life. Face Jack. Face Sawyer and admit that he was right about her. Admit that his accusations had been correct... that she couldn't prove him wrong and make them both happy.
That had been then, anyway.
She'd walked the tracks for awhile, stepping off and hiding in the foliage whenever one of the smallish delivery trains sped past, carrying things too heavy to send my owl and too everyday to burden a courier with. Things like spare cauldrons for the dungeon or shipments of butterbeer for Hogsmeade.
They never stopped for her. Nobody ever followed.
One evening she fell asleep in a small grove just to the side of the tracks, and the next morning they were gone. She searched desperately for hours, but by the time the sun began to sink behind the tall hills, she had given up.
That had been... a little more than four months ago.
Eventually she found a muggle road, which led to a muggle highway, which led to a muggle town. She stole a man's wallet, bought some shoes and lunch with his credit card, then flushed everything but a wad of twenties down a public toilet.
Just outside of town, she bummed a ride with a an old couple. She told them her name was Elysse. Her passport said so, after all.
She stops to rest near a smallish stream, almost too weary to drink her fill. She does so anyway. The blanket fits awkwardly on her shoulders as she bends down to cup her hand in the water, so she lets it slip to the ground. A moment later, she feels it settle on her shoulders. It begins to slip again, but it's pulled up and draped so that it won't fall.
Kate freezes.
Glancing in the chaotic reflection of the running stream, she catches a glimpse of something move behind her. With speed unbefitting her situation, she reaches out quickly and grabs ahold of... something that feels very much like avery large atheletic sock. It whimpers.
"Oh, please missus... Frecklyweezle is so sorry. Please give his punishments for his crimes!"
Kate sits for a moment, still grasping at the hem of a makeshift garment, watching a house elf - something she hadn't seen almost half a year - writhe in agony. She laughs suddenly, brightly.
With a bit of cojoling and promises of exquisite torture, Kate convinces the small elf to lead her to his home. To Hogwarts. To food and magic and shelter and Sawyer and... and... her thoughts lose track as she breaks out of the trees and sees the castle rise beyond the furtherst edge of the great lake.
Frecklyweezle, sensing that his job is done, fidgets for a moment or two before taking off around the edge of the water with uncanny speed.
Kate sits in a heap, mouth agape, quite unsure of anything and everything quite suddenly. Again.
((Kate's back! If you want to get in on the welcoming party, you can either contrive to already be on the lake when she arrives, or be one of the people who the House Elf tells. Frecklyweezle is a gossipy sort, after all.))