A New Year

As the doors to the great hall swung open children from all four houses poured in to have their first feast of the year, and one student in particular was looking forward to this year. James Potter a sixth year Gryffindor with an attitude problem was ready to make his name in this school yet. He was very smart and a great athlete, but also a trouble maker. Now all he needed was the girl of his dreams and she wanted nothing to do with him.

He sat down at the table with disbelief in his eyes as she sat down alone smiling with her red hair falling in her eyes every ten seconds. Of course James wasn't the only student to notice her, another sixth year in the house of Slytherin had his eye on the lovely Lily Evans, Severus Snape. He stroked his long black locks out of his face and saw her smiling at him. Her smile always gave him a jolt of life and her perfect green eyes made his heart go a flutter. James, of course, saw the smile and smacked his hand on the table, as his best friend Sirius sat down beside him.

"Oi! James stop pining after her! This is a new year, and frankly you have to go after the easier girls." Sirius smiled as a few young Ravenclaw girls walked by and he winked at each in turn.

"Padfoot, you are not getting it! I love her and nothing you can say is going to make me feel otherwise." James huffed as he looked at Severus beaming.

James fixed his glasses and grabbed a glass of Pumpkin Juice, as his friend Remus sat down itching his back. Remus was not your ordinary wizard, for he had a curse set upon him ever since he was a child. He was a werewolf and he couldn't control himself while in his wolf state.

"Guys, I think we have a problem." Remus spit out these words softly and quickly so his two friends barely could catch what he said.

"A problem already? Moony I think that's a new record wouldn't you say so Prongs?" Sirius joked, like he always did and ran his hands through his non-existent beard.

Remus scratched his back again and pointed out that there was a group of kids going around praticing the dark arts at the school. Normally, he wouldn't want to stir up trouble but he heard who was one of the members of the group.

"Severus? The bloke who doesn't even know how to shower. Makes perfect sense to me, I mean he always looked a bit dark to me." Sirius laughed at his own jokes like always but saw the fear in James's eyes.

"You don't get it Padfoot. Moony said this because of Lily. We both care about her and if her "friend" is in the dark arts, well, she isn't safe. We need to get her away from him." James said sounding like a true Gryffindor.

Sirius laughed at him and took a swig of his glass of wine. He knew James had gone off the deep end now. From what Remus said, this stuff was powerful and run by none other than Tom Riddle. He of course was the rumoured mass murderer who was as bad as they come. He even was thinking of using a darker title. Sirius would never admit it but he was afraid of the idea of James getting hurt, and he knew how bad it could get, his cousin's were part of this little club.

He knew for awhile that Severus was also in it, but he also knew Severus was always the one who did not know whether to stay in or not. His little brother was his little fact checker and always kept him up to date with his crazy cousins.

"Okay, nevermind them. It's just a silly club like ours, and if anything bad were to happen Headmaster Dumbeldore would stop it. He is one of the best, and won't let anyone hurt Lily." Sirius said with a fake smile on.

James looked up at the headmaster shining in the light of the candles, his beard had gotten longer since last year, and so had his hair. He was getting old, and though none of them wanted to admit it he was their greatest hero. He always seemed to know what to say to comfort them all, but he could tell something was wrong just by the way he started the speech to begin the year.

Lily could tell something was wrong to, and she could tell something was different about Severus. They rarely hung out over the summer and he seemed to be darker. His hair had gotten longer and finer, and he looked more confident. She really actually liked this change but she wouldn't dare to say so. Severus got up after the speech was finished and saw Proffesor Slughorn sitting on his own reading a book and eating some rather dark looking cake.

"Proffesor, I was wondering if you could give me some advice on girl." Severus did not know why he thought that now was the right moment to ask but he trusted his head of house with this kind of question.

"Oh..umm. Severus, can we save this one for class or after? I am really enjoying this cake." Slughorn quickly began to slop it into his mouth as to make it look as if he was busy.

Severus began to walk off grabbing his robes in his hand. His thoughts ran quickly from why was the headmaster's speech so short to why is Slughorn avoiding the simplest of questions? He at first though it could have been because of his meeting with Tom Riddle. He ran to the bathroom to quickly, as he saw a younger fouth year he recognized from the meetings. Barty Crouch Jr. was his name and he waved at Severus with a rather harsh glare.

As he got into the bathroom he splashed water on his face and fixed his hair.

"I just hope I am doing the right thing." He spoke softly and grabbed his cape, as he went back to rejoin the feast.