But despite Mrs Evans’ brave stab at joviality, a cold sense of dread and fear lingered. Presents were exchanged and Christmas dinner eaten, but it was without the usual festive cheer. Lily kept her wand on her at all times, now. Never again would she be caught out like that. She was also determined to brush up on defensive magic once she was back at school and had access to the library. The encounter with the Death Eaters had wrought a sort of change in her. She no longer felt detached from the baleful headlines in the Daily Prophet, and when the image of the little boy, crying quietly into his sister’s robes, she felt a stab of understanding, a connection with him that she had not felt before. Yet she also felt fear. Would she be the next one to receive such news? Her parents were not like other members of the wizarding community; they could not keep their heads down and try to avoid getting on the wrong side of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named’s supporters. Their crime was their blood, and their lack of magic, the very thing that rendered them defenceless from attacks.
This was why, three days before Lily had to go back to Hogwarts, she was beating the once-familiar path to the house where Severus lived with his mother. She had been thinking about what would happen when she went back to school ever since the attack; her worst fear was that the Death Eaters would return to finish the job. She had turned it over in her mind, and decided the only course of action was the one she was taking now. She could not cast an enchantment that hid her house from malicious eyes, even if she knew how; she was still underage. But there was one person who lived close by who wasn’t underage, and so she had decided to go and visit Eileen Snape.
Had it been under any other circumstances, Lily would have burst out laughing at the look of utter shock on Eileen’s face when she opened the door.
‘Goodness!’ she exclaimed after inviting Lily into the kitchen. ‘Certainly didn’t expect you, if you’ll wait a moment, I’ll fetch Severus for you...’
As Eileen had turned to leave the room, Lily thought she glanced a shadowy figure with long, black hair standing behind the door to the hall. With a jolt, she remembered that Severus would turn seventeen in only five days time. But by then, they’d be back at school and he would be unable to help. Plus, Lily was reluctant to ask him for help, or even talk to him again, especially given what had happened. No, Lily was incredibly pleased she didn’t have to have that particular conversation.
‘No,’ she said, returning her gaze to Eileen. ‘It’s you I’ve come to see.’
Eileen simply stared as she turned back around to face Lily. She showed no signs of speaking, so Lily ploughed on.
‘I want to ask you to do me a favour,’ she said slowly. She had rehearsed this speech in her head many times, worried that she sounded too impertinent, but now she was here, all her preparation and memorised lines seemed to have deserted her, so she merely garbled, ‘I want you to help protect my parents.’
Eileen raised an eyebrow.
‘I mean, I was wondering if you could please help me--’
‘Yes, I know what you mean,’ Eileen said, cutting through Lily’s hurried explanation. She sighed heavily and sat down at the worn kitchen table and rubbed her face with her hand. ‘I never meant to send them to your house, you know,’ she said finally, looking up at Lily. ‘I’m sorry for what happened. Severus told me -- is your father okay?’
‘He’s got a few broken ribs, but he’ll be okay,’ Lily replied. She never knew quite what to make of Eileen Snape. When she was younger, she had been scared of this thin woman with her permanent scowl and seemingly sullen attitude, but as she had grown older, fear had given way to sympathy as Eileen sank further and further into a kind of lonely apathy.
This was the woman she was now; quiet and lethargic, she was roused by very little. Even now, when she was clearly sorry for the harm done, she didn’t seem as if she could quite summon the energy to appear sincere.
Eileen said nothing. Lily waited for her to reply, but she remained silent, she said, ‘Will you help me?’
Still Eileen did not speak. She was looking up at Lily, an unreadable expression on her face. She looked more tired and worn out than ever.
‘Please,’ Lily said, trying to keep her voice even, although she was flaring up inside at Eileen’s apparent cowardice. ‘I would do it myself, but I don’t turn seventeen until the end of January, and I can’t get back then until Easter. I’m -- I’m terrified that the Death Eaters’ll come back to finish my parents off, and I won’t be able to help if I’m not there. I don’t know what to do except to ask you to help me. The Ministry -- they turned up after the attack, they’d sensed magic being performed in my house and came to investigate. I told them what had happened, but they wouldn’t put protective charms on the house. They said they couldn’t--’
Anger swarmed up inside her as Lily remembered the change in the obnoxious Ministry official’s face when she had explained that this was not a matter of underage magic, but a savage attack on her father. His face had drained of colour and he became anxious, looking about the place as if he expected the attackers to be hiding in the cupboard under the stairs, ready to jump out at any moment. He had hastily explained, with many stutters and apologies, that the Ministry was far too busy at the moment, there had been an attack on several important department members during the night and resources were stretched. He left Lily standing aghast at his cowardice as he strode back out of the front door.
She looked imploringly at Eileen, wishing, hoping she’d say yes. The older woman looked at Lily for a long time, unblinking and apparently thinking hard. Finally, she spoke.
‘I will help you,’ she said, and Lily felt something close to joy erupt in her chest. ‘I haven’t done anything that complex in years, but I will try.’
And so the enchantment was cast. It was only simple, Eileen said, and she doubted it would hold off powerful bouts of magic, but it would keep Lily’s family safe for the mean time, until Lily could place a more efficient one on herself.
And so there remained only one more thing to sort out. Mark.
Little though she wanted to, she knew she had to end things with him. If she was truly honest with herself, she had known this from the beginning; they were just too different, and her life was too complicated. She could not keep feeding him lies about her school and her life there; she had nearly slipped up several times, to keep up the facade in a long-term relationship would be near on impossible, in the end, she would let something slip, and then she’d get into trouble with the Ministry of Magic. She didn’t know what their policies on Muggle partners were, but she doubted leniency would be granted to a sixteen-year-old who accidentally let slip to her seventeen-year-old boyfriend about her Charms homework.
Plus, Mark was such an open and honest, down-to-earth sort of guy that Lily felt terrible lying to him. She hated the fact that she was deceiving him, especially when he genuinely believed she was such a wonderful person. Whenever she had to make up some fact or other about her school, she felt dirty and cheap. There was also the unwelcome fact that she had spent so much time away from the Muggle world, she was realising she actually had little understanding of how it really worked. When she first realised this, she had felt a burn of shame so great Mark had teased her about being embarrassed. She knew only the subjects studied in school were the ones she had done in Primary school, and she had no idea about the latest music or teenage crazes, apart from those that Petunia talked about.
So the question was; did she really belong here anymore? She had never really given this any thought before; she had always assumed she would comfortably be part of both wizarding and Muggle worlds, but the more she seemed to think about it, the more she was leaving the Muggle world behind, the world she was born into and the world she had lived in until she was eleven years old. She would get a wizarding job (seeing as she had no Muggle qualifications, she had little choice, even if she’d wanted to), live in a wizarding household, keep up with wizarding news, and possibly even marry a wizard. Where did that leave the Muggle world?
But even if she managed to bridge the worlds, Mark never could. He could never belong, even if he tried; there would always be the gulf of magic between them. She could rant away about how difficult she found non-verbal spells, or complain about how she couldn’t get a particular potion quite right, and Mark could murmur and agree with her, but he would never be able to truly understand. Would it lead to indifference and him seeking someone with whom he had more in common, or would it turn to hatred, as it had with Eileen Snape and her husband? She couldn’t bear Mark thinking of her in either way.
However, the crux of the matter for Lily was the danger he’d be in if he tried to be a part of both worlds. Like her parents, he was defenceless against the Death Eaters and as a Muggle married or going out with a Muggle-born, he would be a figure for attack, and Lily couldn’t let that happen.
With her parents, she had no choice, but she could save Mark. She wouldn’t let him get caught up in events that could leave him dead.
And so she made up her mind.
She had been avoiding him since Christmas, trying to think of the best way to end things with him, but when he called at her house two days before she was due back at school, she knew she had to act.
She couldn’t summon her usual, cheerful personality that shone through whenever she had been in Mark’s company, and she thought he could sense a change in her. They didn’t speak much as they wandered around the village, tentatively holding hands, until they reached the playground. There, Lily decided she had to do it.
‘Mark,’ she said as they reached the brightly painted gates that led to the playground. ‘I... we have to talk.’
He gave a sad little smile as he turned to face her, and Lily felt a pang of guilt; he knew what was coming.
‘It’s okay, Lily,’ he said. ‘Really. If I’m honest, I thought it might come to this.’
‘Really?’ Lily said, slightly taken aback despite herself.
‘Yeah, I mean, you go to school miles away, we’d only see each other in the holidays...’ he tailed off and sighed, staring over the misty playground towards the copse.
Lily couldn’t think of anything to say in reply to this. After a moment of awkward silence, Mark turned back to her and grinned.
‘Still, I had a great time with you,’ he said.
‘So did I,’ she replied honestly. ‘You made things bearable for a while.’
‘Glad I could help,’ he said, his grin faltering a little, and Lily guessed that he was more upset than he was trying to show.
‘Look, I know I didn’t have to, I know you said not to, but I got you a little something for Christmas. Here...’
He pulled a package wrapped in paper covered in pictures of holly and Christmas bells out of his jacket pocket and thrust it into her hands. It was oddly squidgy yet lumpy in places.
‘You seemed to enjoy the pictures, so I bought it for you...’ he glanced down at her and for a moment seemed on the verge of saying something else, before seemingly thinking better of it.
‘Look, I better get going,’ he said. ‘If you get back on one of your school holidays and get lonely...’ He grinned at her one last time, before turning and striding back up the lane.
Lily tore the paper off the present to find a stuffed Pink Panther toy. Her eyes welled up as she remembered their date, and for a moment wanted to call him back and tell him she didn’t want to end things, but she clamped her mouth shut.