"Right," Spencer agreed, voice slurring a little with tiredness. At any other time in his life, he might not have been able to sleep, too nervous or too conscious of what was about to happen, but he was so tired, all the time, and he'd barely closed his eyes before the world went dark.
It lasted for a while, an easy sort of blackness where Spencer could think about nothing at all, time flying by. Normally, of course, he'd be completely unconscious, but after weeks of nightmares he'd developed the habit of being almost conscious during the dark before the dream, safe for now, terrified of what was to come.
It came, too, the way it always did, and Spencer found himself sitting on the gentle slope of the lawns outside Hogwarts, the grass green beneath him. He was meant to be looking for someone, he knew, beyond the terrifying clutch at his heart, but instead he sat completely still, arms around his knees, staring down at the group of adults clustered in a tight knot only a little way away from him. It was most of the staff, he knew without looking. A safe distance from them were children crying and terrified, many of them hurt, being shepherded away by Ministry officials and healers. Spencer didn't pay much attention to any of that at all, though, fixated on the thing that always caught him first, the thing that he'd come to associate with the bitter, ashy taste in his mouth upon waking.