Disclaimer: still don't own harry potter...
(A/N: thank you for all the lovely reviews!! You guys are really inspiring and always make me want to write more! This chapter is FAIRLY long, but I hope it's interesting enough that you'll get through it alright. If you have any questions or constructive critisism, don't hesitate in asking/telling)
Chapter 7: Discoveries
That evening, Lily lounged in one of the armchairs by the fire in the common room. She was reading a romance novel that Stephanie had leant to her. It was the first non-muggle novel she had read outside of her school work and it was extremely odd, but she liked it none the less even though it was annoying when it’d scream at her not to put it down. Wizard books had a mind of their own, not unlike the wizard chess pieces. Beside her, Stephanie sat knitting by magic. Lily caught her glancing every once and a while at the corner of the room where the marauders (and more importantly, Sirius) sat, whispering furiously to one another about Lily could only assume, was a prank.
Raven was chatting amiably to the both of them, not very concerned that neither were paying her much attention. She was so peaceful and comfortable that Lily never wanted Monday to come. She put down her book, a little bored with the ever tragic history of Wendell and Wanda, and decided to actually listen to Raven, who was rambling about pumped up first years.
"They are so full of themselves! They just gather in the hall in these stupid circles that make it impossible to get by! I swear one of these days I’m going to hex them, teach them a bloody lesson! " Raven ranted.
"Just don’t do it in front of me. I don’t want to take points from my own house, let alone my best friend," Lily told her.
"Alright, I’ll just tell you to look the other way," Raven said.
Lily grinned and was about to say something but Stephanie poked her with a knitting needle. When Lily looked at her, she indicated to the back corner. Lily looked and saw that James and Remus seemed to be in an argument of some sort. Their whispers were growing increasingly louder and both were extremely red in the face.
Remus stood up abruptly, causing his chair to fall over backwards. "You are the biggest bloody git in the world!" he shouted at James, causing the whole room to fall silent.
James gave Remus a disgusted look like he was something nasty that had just climbed out from under a rock, instead of one of his best friends. Remus, in return, shot him a loathing look before stomping past a group of scared second year girls and clambering out of the portrait hole.
The whole common room was deadly silent. No one could ever remember a pair of marauders in a fight with each other before. Silly arguments, sure, all the time; but never ever an actual fight.
Lily watched as Sirius leant over to James and whispered something she couldn’t hear into his ear. James seemed to relax a bit, but not much; he still looked angry. He got up off his chair and headed towards the boys’ dormitory stairs where he promptly stormed up them. For the first time in her entire life, Lily felt like she wanted to comfort James, to run up the stairs after him and find out what was wrong. She remained sitting however, controlling her random emotions. The common room was still eerily silent, it didn’t fit well with the happily crackling fire and the comfortable appearance.
"Oi, Sirius, next time you and your friends feel like putting on a skit don’t make it a drama!" Raven said loudly.
The tense silence evaporated and everyone slowly began chatting merrily once again. It had only been a joke, they thought, it hadn’t been real. They didn’t notice that Sirius was gaping like a fish and Stephanie was shooting daggers at her friend.
~*~
Later, up in the girls’ dormitory, as Raven, Stephanie and Lily were getting ready for bed, Stephanie accused Raven of liking Sirius.
"You think I what!?" Raven exclaimed, looking shocked.
"You like him!" Stephanie said, "I don’t know why I didn’t see it. The teasing, cursing and constant anger between you two! Clear signs that you’re in love!"
"You’re mad," Raven said simply, her eyes wide. "If I was in love that stupid blighter I wouldn’t be acting like I hated him or whatever odd thing you’re accusing me of! I’d be like you: hanging all over him and constantly making ridiculous giggling noises!"
"I do not!" Stephanie protested, but she was blushing.
"Do too!" Raven retorted, rather wittily in Lily’s sarcastic opinion.
They went on like this for awhile before Lily finally burst out, "Would you two shut up? Stephanie there is nothing wrong with the way you’ve been flirting with Sirius! Raven, would you quit being so obviously hateful towards the guy she fancies! She doesn’t know who to defend when you do!"
Raven scowled at Lily and opened her mouth to say something, but Lily held up a hand and went on, "I know he’s annoying and spiteful but just don’t say such nasty things about him in front of Stephanie. Besides, he’s not that bad."
"He called me a hippo!" she protested lamely.
"It was a joke," Lily said rolling her eyes. "And you set his robes on fire! Let’s just all go to bed and if you two still want to fight in the morning that’s fine by me. For now would you let it go? I want to go to sleep!"
They agreed, grudgingly, knowing that they hadn’t seen the half of Lily’s temper. She sighed her relief and got into bed, drawing the curtains around it. Slowly she drifted off to sleep, dreading the next day.
~*~
Raven and Stephanie didn’t continue their argument the next morning and Lily was thankful since Monday mornings were bad enough as it was without her two friends arguing throughout it all. She did, however, notice that Remus was sitting by himself at the end of the Gryffindor table. When they went to charms Remus had no partner, so Lily asked him to be hers. She would’ve had to go with someone else anyways since Raven and Stephanie usually were partners in charms class, having gotten tired of Lily’s annoying perfectness at the subject.
Flitwick told them all to review the charms he’d spent all of September, and the last six years, teaching them. The student with the most interesting combination of charms would win house points. So Lily stood next to Remus, charming the items on her desk non-stop. She waited until everyone was fully immersed in their work before asking, "Is everything alright, Remus?"
"Everything is fine," he told her in an even tone.
"Sure it is," Lily agreed, "I mean you just felt like sitting by yourself at breakfast this morning and Peter is a horrible partner in charms class."
She knew he was looking at her to see if she was being sarcastic, but she kept her face expressionless. Living with her sister Petunia had it’s advantages. She was now very good at masking her emotions. They both went back to charming things for awhile. Lily made her apple flash different colours and lyrics to the songs it was signing would appear across it’s surface, allowing people to sing along. Professor Flitwick came and giggled at it, complimenting her on her creativity. He went away and Lily became rather bored.
"It’s stupid," Remus finally muttered. Lily didn’t say anything, but she looked at him with an expression of concern. He glanced at her and then went on quietly, purposely avoiding looking into her eyes again. "I thought I was going to be made Head Boy, not him. I know it’s not his fault, he didn’t ask for it, but it’s annoying. He’s already quidditch captain, why does he have to be Head Boy too?" He murmured a charm, trying to make the stuffed toy in front of him dance, but since he was upset all it did was a kind of pathetic jig before falling off the desk and becoming still once more.
"I bet James was surprised you weren’t made Head Boy too," Lily said comfortingly.
"It was the first thing he said to me about it. That just made it worse, he had to be all nice about it so I couldn’t even be mad at the stupid prick without feeling even more guilty about it," Remus said bitterly, picking the stuffed toy he was charming and throwing it roughly back onto the desk.
"He was probably worried something like this would happen, you know? He didn’t want to lose a best friend," Lily said soothingly.
Remus shrugged his shoulders. "Perfect Potter," she heard him mutter, but he seemed to be thinking things over. He tried to charm the stuffed toy again and this time he was successful. Fireworks were spurting out of the bouquet of flowers the thing was holding.
Professor Flitwick applauded enthusiastically. "Oh! Very well done Mr Lupin!" he exclaimed, jumping up and down. Several people laughed at the small man’s cheeriness, and everyone was looking over at Lily and Remus. Lily caught a pair of hazel eyes on her and smiled at James. He gave a weak smile back before his gaze shifted obviously to Remus and then back to Lily. She gave him a curious look and he shrugged, breaking eye contact with her. He’s upset too, Lily thought. He obviously cared a lot more for his friends than she had ever given him credit for.
"Is it worth losing one of your best friends over this?" she asked him quietly.
Remus didn’t get the chance to respond as Flitwick called for silence and announced that he and Lily had tied for first and Gryffindor was awarded thirty points.
Lily went through the rest of her morning classes without any problem. When she entered the Great Hall for lunch she was pleased to see the Remus was once again sitting with the other marauders. They were talking happily and seemed to have put their troubles behind them. She allowed herself a little self-satisfied gloat that it was all because of her before joining her friends, and Elise at the lunch table.
~*~
"James, come on! We’ve got to go!" Lily said impatiently. They had to patrol the corridors tonight and he was sitting, goofing off, with Sirius and Peter and... "Where’s Remus?" she asked curiously, noting his absence.
"He’s not feeling too well. Went to the hospital wing. Shall we go then?" James said hurriedly.
"Alright..." Lily said in suspicious way. He had spoken so quickly that she was sure he was lying to her. He practically dragged her out of the portrait hole. "You didn’t lock him in a suit of armor or something did you?" she asked anxiously once they were outside, in the corridors.
"No, Lily, you know how often he gets sick," James said innocently, but Lily couldn’t shake the feeling that he was lying to her. That seemed to be happening a lot that evening. Moments before she told James it was time to go Timothy had come up to her, looking scared about something. But when she asked what wrong he simply asked when did a werewolf transform.
"During the full moon," she told him. "Almost every twenty-eight days." He had nodded and then shuffled back over to his little group of friends. Lily knew that wasn’t what he had wanted to ask her. He may have been poor at schoolwork, but everyone knew when werewolves transformed. Even muggle-borns like him would know, since they were frequently in their movies and books.
Lily and James walked through the corridors in a comfortable silence, checking classrooms as they went along. Moonlight illuminated the dark school. Lily walked over to a window and gazed out at the full moon, admiring its beauty.
“It’s so pretty,” she said to James and he walked over to look out the window with her.
“Yeah…” he replied, but didn’t sound like he agreed so much.
“I love patrolling when there is a full moon,” Lily said sighing, and then she thought of something curious. “It’s odd,” she mused, “I don’t ever remember Remus being with me when we had a patrol during the full moon. He was always ill…”
“Huh. Imagine that,” James said, and the awkwardness was not lost on Lily. In fact, she thought, Remus disappeared at least once a month... and it always seemed to be around the time of the full moon...
“Oh my god,” she said as realization hit her. Remus was a werewolf! All those lame excuses he made up; his mother was sick, he had to visit his father, a family member died; why didn’t she see through them all? It was so obvious, yet she didn’t want to believe it. It was crazy. She span to face James. “He can’t be!”
“Sorry?” James asked in a determinedly innocent voice.
“You know! You know Remus is a“ ”
“Don’t!” James said furiously, covering her mouth with a cold hand. “Lily, don’t say anything. You can’t just go around shouting those things out,”he added in a hoarse whisper.
Lily nodded, and sensing that she wasn’t about to scream for the world to hear that his friend was a werewolf, he took his hand from her face. “How long has he...?” she asked quietly.
“Since before Hogwarts,” James whispered. “You won’t tell anyone will you?”
“What do you take me for? Of course I won’t tell!” Lily snapped. She knew what would happen if Remus’s secret leaked out. She imagined him running for his life as a group of angry students ran after him with pitchforks.
“At least now I don’t have to curse you,” James said in a friendly joking way.
Lily could tell that he wanted to drop the subject, but she had so many questions. “How long have you known?” she asked in a whisper.
“Since third year. Sirius and I figured it out,” he replied.
Lily nodded. She felt so sorry for Remus, and then she remembered something that made her feel worse. In third year, when they’d been studying werewolves, the whole class had gotten into a very heated discussion of how dangerous and horrible werewolves were. Thinking back, she remembered how James and Sirius argued with everyone, saying that werewolves weren’t that bad.
She couldn’t believe that James and Sirius hadn’t told anyone, hadn’t spread it around the school. They were both pure-blooded and must’ve grown up with prejudices against werewolves. Her head was going around in circles. Maybe James hadn’t changed this year, maybe he’d always been the way she knew him to be now. Maybe she was the one who had changed. Or was it simply because she’d finally given him a chance?
She lifted her gaze to find the person who filled her thoughts staring at her. He didn’t look away when their eyes met like any person would usually do. “We should go,” Lily said nervously, her heart pounding oddly fast. She swept past James, and they continued their patrol as if nothing had happened. Though, Lily was thinking about it quite a lot, thoughts of James Potter also filled her head.
~*~
Three weeks later, it was the Hogsmede Halloween weekend and Lily still hadn’t totally figured things out. Remus knew she’d discovered his secret and he was very calm about it, although she felt rather insulted when he said he was surprised she hadn’t figured it out sooner. She didn’t just automatically assume people were werewolves if they got sick every once and a while! She was in silent awe of Remus for being so calm about his situation. Had it been her, she would have been freaking out constantly every time the full moon approached. Or maybe perhaps after a period of time she would have gotten used to it...
“Lily? Lily!” Raven’s frustrated voice penetrated Lily’s thoughts.
“What?” she asked, pushing away the hand Raven was waving obnoxiously in front of her face. The three girls had just entered Hogsmede and Lily hadn’t even noticed.
“If you had been listening you would know that Steph and I want to go to Zonko’s first,” Raven said, her tan face flushed with impatience.
“Sorry,” Lily said, “I’ve just got“ ”
“A lot on your mind,” Stephanie and Raven chanted along. Lately, Lily always had a lot on her mind.
“You’ve had a lot on your mind ever since the ministry officials came and went with no leads to who was responsible for that girl’s attack,” Stephanie said, finger-combing her blond hair (a nervous habit) and looking at Lily in a concerned way. Raven nodded her head in agreement, making her brown ringlets bounce funnily.
Lily was thankful that they assumed that was the only thing on her mind. It was an extreme disappointment to everyone at Hogwarts when the ministry officials had left empty handed, but Lily had been relieved that they hadn’t taken Hagrid away. He’d told her about how they questioned him. Looking at him like he had already been convicted. She couldn’t imagine being treated that way. Hagrid had told her that he was surprised they hadn’t taken him away, it certainly seemed like they would after they finished questioning him.
“Ah... Zonko’s... I wish I could marry it,” Raven sighed as they entered the store. Lily and Stephanie laughed as their friend ran to the shelves upon shelves of pranking devices, her eyes sparkling like a child’s on Christmas day. Stephanie and Lily went a little more slowly, but they were having fun looking at all the weird items in the shop. Lily stopped and picked up a kit that would allow you to inflate someone’s head.
“Too bad they didn’t have these last year,” she sighed, putting it back on the shelves. She saw Stephanie and Raven exchange secretive looks. “What?”
“Oh, nothing,” they both said at the same time, which completely contradicted them.
“Tell me!” Lily demanded, but they wouldn’t budge even though she didn’t give it up until after they had all made purchases (Raven’s quite a lot larger than the other two) and decided it was time for the traditional Three Broomsticks visit.
When they stepped inside it was so packed with students they could hardly move without bumping into someone. It was slow going, making their way to a table in the far back corner that was empty. Raven had to fight off a group of fourth years who had also spotted the table.
“See what I mean about the younger grades? They just don’t respect their elders!” Raven exclaimed.
“Funny,” Lily mused, “I seem to recall you making a seventh year cry in fifth year...”
Raven blushed a little bit. “That doesn’t count! He was a Hufflepuff, they’re all a bunch of saps!”
“Hey!” said a Hufflepuff at a near-by table. She was a fellow seventh year by the name of Natalie Jada, one that Lily liked a lot as a herbology partner. “We are not!”
“Of course not. You didn’t let me finish!” Raven exclaimed.
Natalie’s brown eyes narrowed in disbelief and her lips were pursed. “Oh yeah? What were you going to say then?”
“I believe it was; Not only are they a bunch of saps, but they’re terrible at quidditch as well!” all four girls span around to see Sirius Black and his fellow marauders. Sirius’s usually low voice had gone up a few pitches to mimic Raven who was currently scowling.
"That's not true," Lily said "They were second in the league last year." Natalie gave a distinct ‘hmpf’ before getting up from her table and pushing her way out of the place. This was understandable, as no female (with the exception of Raven and perhaps Lily) ever argued with Sirius. He flashed a cocky grin at the girl’s back and slid in beside Stephanie.
“You don’t mind do you? There’s no extra tables,” he pouted at her, his dark eyes sparkling with mischief.
Stephanie shook her head and let out a girly giggle that Raven rolled her eyes at. Lily moved over to make room for James as he slid in next to her. Remus sat beside Raven and Peter on the other side of Stephanie. Lily was uncomfortably aware that most of the left-side of her body was touching James. She having trouble breathing and her heart was pounding uncomfortably in her chest.
Oh no, Lily thought remembering that just the night before Wanda (from her wizard romance novel) had felt the same things when in contact with Wendell. But that was just a silly romance novel! She wasn’t falling in love with James. No... she couldn’t be...
“Are you looking forward to the feast, Lily?” James asked her, and her breath caught in her throat. His hair was so adorably messy. She remembered how she used to hate the way he constantly messed it up, but now... the way it stood up at the back...
“ATTACK! ATTACK! THERE’S BEEN ANOTHER ATTACK!” Natalie Jada had returned and she was in hysterics. Everyone fell silent and she made her way towards Lily, who got up and went to meet her.
“What do you mean, Natalie?” she tried to ask calmly, but her voice shook.
“There’s been another attack! It’s that boy you’re always tutoring in the library!” she screeched, her face deadly white.
Lily felt all the colour drain from her and her legs trembled, suddenly finding it difficult to support her bodies weight.
“Timothy? Did you find Timothy? Where is he!” she demanded shakily.
“In the alley! He’s... he’s...” but Natalie seemed to have started hyperventilating. Her hand went to her chest and her face was in a pained expression. Lily looked into her terrified brown eyes to find that they were glistening with tears.
“Somebody get her some water!” Lily shouted, from the corner of her eye she saw someone obey her. “If there’s a healer in here, you’d better follow me NOW!” she commanded and stormed out of the Three Broomsticks, leaving Natalie to someone else’s care. She ran down the ally that was beside the Three Broomsticks. Many students used this as a shortcut from Zonko’s, Lily herself had just used it...
Beside a waste disposal unit lay a small body. Lily skidded to a halt beside it and fell to her knees. She shook violently as she turned Timothy’s frail frame over. Plastered on the middle of his pale for head was the Dark Mark, over the brick wall behind him were the words ‘Guess who’s next?’ in a violent shimmering deep green.
The last thing she remembered was James running up behind her and swearing as he saw what was written and how Timothy was. She felt his arms wrap around her in a comforting hug. After that, there were only giant blurs and a lot of black.
(A/N: congrats on getting through it all! *gives you a sparkly tiara (or whatever you fancy really)* hope you enjoyed it!)