Lily Bud

Year One Chapter One

Lily Evans sat on her new bed for the first time. It was huge and was surrounded by heavy red curtains. She pulled them open to talk with the other girls.

Lily shared the room with four girls. They all introduced themselves when they walked up the stairs. Gwen Glassor and Gundola Beararm were already thick as thieves. They knew each other long before Hogwarts. They sat together on one bed and had introduced themselves so fast that Lily wasn't sure who was who.

The other two girls were Dorcas Meadowes and Sulfia MacEllis. Dorcas was sweet, shy and spoke with a soft voice. Sulfia on the other hand seemed so sure of herself and carried herself in an aloof manner.

Lily continued telling them about her life, how she was muggleborn and she had a friend in Slytherin, who wanted her to be in that house instead. Dorcas looked a bit shocked and Sulfia screwed up her nose.

"Well he is either really mean or really stupid." Sulfia told her as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

Surprised by her comment, Lily's cheeks flushed with anger. "You don't know Sev! Why would you say something like that about him?" She didn't think she would like Sulfia. She reminded her of those arrogant boys on the train.

Sulfia's eyes widened in shock. "You are muggleborn and he wants you to go to Slytherin." She shook her head and spoke with such authority that Lily almost felt stupid asking the question.

"Sulfia," Dorcas said in a calming voice, "Lily is muggleborn. She doesn't know about Slytherin…" The shy girl obviously wanted to smooth the tension, but Lily only felt embarrassed. Sulfia looked taken aback about the idea that someone didn't have the same opinion as her about Slytherin.

To Lily's surprise Gwen and Gundola joined the conversation and explained the situation to her.

"Slytherin is all about purebloods and that stuff." One of them said, Gwen, maybe, or was it Gundola. They even looked a bit alike, with their long brown hairs and in their school uniforms.

"They are no muggleborns in Slytherin. They are basically not allowed in there." The other one continued.

"There has never ever been a muggleborn in Slytherin."

Lily was speechless. Slytherin had a problem with muggleborns? But Sev said it didn't make a difference. Lily bit her lip.

"Actual that's not true," Sulfia informed them with a smirk, clearly pleased to know more than the rest of them. "There were some muggleborns that got sorted into Slytherin."

"Really?"

"Are you sure?"

"I never heard that before ."

The other three all seemed to think that a muggleborn Slytherin was unbelievable or made up. But Lily wanted to puff her chest. Sev hadn't lied to her!

But Sulfia stood by her words. "Yes, a dozen or more even. They just never survived long enough to even make their O. . Never mind graduate from Hogwarts. They always have an 'accident' or 'kill themselves' before that." She raised her hands to put quotation marks around the words accident and kill themselves. She clearly didn't believe in accidents or anything of that sort.

Lily felt dread build up in her stomach. Surely, Sev didn't know about any of this or he would never have wanted to go to Slytherin. Once he found out about that, he wouldn't want to stay there, but he couldn't leave his house! Her feeling of dread was quickly joined by worry and sadness for her friend.

Some of the other girls asked Sulfia how she knew any of that.

"My mum is on the school board and there is a list with all students that somehow died while they were students in Hogwarts. Most of them are just illnesses and stuff, but Mum said that it is a little joke for the school board that if a muggleborn is sorted into Slytherin, they have to prepare for one less graduate at the end of the seven years." The other girls giggled uncomfortably.

"I don't think Sev knows about any of that…" Lily mumbled.

"Well then he is stupid and not mean." Sulfia said and swept her long blonde hair over her shoulder. "I mean, everybody knows that muggleborn are unwanted in Slytherin. To want to be in that house Slytherin but not know about their blood purity beliefs, you have to be a bit stupid…"

Lily didn't know what to say to any of this and was relieved when Sulfia started to talk about her family. She feigned interest as Sulfia droned on about her two older sisters, one in Ravenclaw and one in Hufflepuff.

First, a huge thank you to Hurricanhairandemeraldeyes for being my beta reader and putting so much work into my stories. I can't express how grateful I am to you.

Disclaimer: The characters are not mine and I don't make money with this story. I write and share it for my own entertainment and that of my readers.

AN: I hope you like the story. It will be a lot longer than The Best, mostly because it is not only about the relationship between Lily and James, but about Lily and a lot of people, including James, Severus, Petunia, her parents, the marauders and some other friends I made up or just borrowed the name from.

This first chapter is already a lot darker than most of The Best. Lily is confront with the fact that the magical world is not as Severus told her. There is some darkness there. Muggleborn are unwanted in Slytherin, where Severus wanted her to go. I always found it strange that Snape told Lily to try to get into Slytherin. One of the best known facts about Slytherin is that they don't want 'mudbloods' there. Everybody knows that, that grows up around magic. That only let me come to the conclusion that Snape didn't actual know as much about Hogwarts as he made Lily believe. Maybe his mother just didn't want to share is darker side with her son, but to Lily it most have been a shock. There are no mudbloods in Slytherin and if one dares to go there anyway, I would argue that you only need one person crazy enough to see it as an affront so deeply that they want to do something about it and considering the people we see in that house, it is not unlikely that someone would arrange for an accident to happen.

I hope you like it and please leave a review to help me improve and be motivated.

Have a nice day.