Celestia's heart seemed to be pounding at almost triple its normal rate; she could feel the thumping in her throat as the icy sensation that had started down her back seemed to spread throughout her body.

The seconds seemed to both slog along at a terribly slow pace and yet time was passing too quickly. She thought that she could hear girls' voices shouting (Rylee and Quinn) nearby, but she couldn't tell how close the girls actually were to the rest of the group. She fervently hoped that they were far enough to simply run away.

For Celestia had already regretted not shouting at the students behind her to run themselves as the Inferi spread out and surrounded their little group faster than she had expected. The professor didn't waste another second on her thoughts, but neither did she cast her spells aloud. She simply brandished her wand at the nearest two Inferi like a whip and a stream of flames spread from her wand tip in the shape of a rope that she attempted to coil around both of the Inferi at once. Her intention was to bind them together so that they'd burn together.

Abra's scream caused Celestia to do something rather foolish; she whipped around, briefly facing only the students, to see if he'd been injured or if some new horror had come up on his side of the group. By the time she was turned in his direction, however, the Gryffindor was already casting Incendio and Celestia could release the breath that she hadn't even realized she'd been holding.

She spun back around to face the front and cast a nonverbal Incendio at more approaching Inferi. Good Merlin, there were so many of them! She was at a loss for how to get them out of this, except to keep burning the wretched things and hope that the fire would attract help from her coworkers. Surely this was the only place on the grounds that the Inferi had assembled.

Celestia turned her back to the Inferi once again as Derfael shouted out Julie's name -- but she didn't look hurt, the Hufflepuff seemed to already be drawing the girl closer to the rest of the group. Good. As she was assessing this situation, though, her eyes landed on Bel's beater bat and she noted the lack of a wand in the Hufflepuff girl's hands. Cursing Merlin's pants under her breath, Celestia swiveled to face the Inferi still marching toward her and fire off several more Incendio's in their direction. At the same time, she groped in her robes with her left hand for something she could use until finally, her sweaty hand grasped a hair pin. The professor wasted no time in pulling it out and Transfiguring it into a flaming torch like the ones that adorned the walls of Hogwarts Castle. Celestia carefully turned her body sideways so that her wand arm was still spewing flames in the Inferi's direction, while the newly formed torch was outstretched in her other arm -- she was careful to avoid letting the flames snare students' robes or hair from behind as she called loudly, "Bel! Take this!"

She was allowing her attention to waver dangerously, but there was really no choice. These students were her responsibility and it would be a miracle if one of them survived without any fire at all. She refused to consider the possibility that they wouldn't survive this night even with fire as she held the torch out to Bel.