If the caterers can't make it on the fourteenth, can we switch things to the sixteenth? And what about the florists? The date just can't be changed on them out of nowhere. Oh, if Mum were here, she'd be absolutely mad over all these details. I wish she'd—
"Evans!"
In a back, unused office located on the second level of the Ministry of Magic, a covert meeting was being held. The center of the room featured a long, heavily polished wooden table that was currently packed to capacity with the finest Aurors England had to offer, all squeezed together in uncomfortable tightness without so much room as to breathe, let alone move. As Lily Evans jerked from her thoughts abruptly, she succeeded in elbowing the two colleagues on her either side, eliciting a groan from the one on her right and a dark, sharp curse from the one on her left. Shuffling the papers in front of her in an attempt to look ready to go and at attention, she looked up into the perpetually sweaty, red face of Maximilian Stern, Head Auror and in charge of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, and knew from his expression that it was not the first time he'd said her name.
Uh-oh.
Stern was not a patient man, and he was also not a man well renowned for his kindness. He sneered at Lily, not impressed or fooled by her attempt at attention, and in that one look Lily felt that she was not an adult at the age of twenty-one, but a worried student back at Hogwarts about to be scolded for skiving off class. "Do you need a break, Evans, or is it okay for us to continue?"
"Of course you can continue, sir." Meek and humble were two things not commonly attributed to the normally cheeky and fiery redhead, but it was exactly how Lily sounded as she subconsciously sunk a little lower in her chair, fighting off the urge to blush, highly aware that everyone was gawking at her. "I'm sorry."
"Then maybe you could be so kind as to give us the figures on the McCullen raid."
It was all patronizing and fake kindness in his speech, but Lily jumped on it, eager to give her bit of the information he'd clearly been seeking from her as her thoughts had been elsewhere, and she again riffled through the scrolls of parchment in front of her, looking for the paperwork she'd filled out just that morning. Of course, she cruelly could not find it, and the silence of the room became awkwardly suffocating as her search went on and she became more and more flustered, lost in the sea of paperwork before her.
It was finally Alastor Moody, the man at her left she'd just elbowed, who either took pity on her or got frustrated from her lack of results and reached a gnarled hand out, plucking a sheet of parchment from the piles that was miraculously the right one. Lily cast him a grateful look, one the increasingly famed Auror characteristically ignored, and she was for the first time grateful for the magical eye that resided in his empty socket. Normally its whizzing made her feel sick. Now, thanks to its superhuman seeing abilities, she could have kissed him.
She recited the facts dutifully, careful not to skim over the details: that she and a band of Aurors had been responding to a reliable source's tip when they'd raided the McCullen manor and discovered several very suspicious-looking Dark Arts materials, some of which had been transported to the Misuse of Muggle Artifacts office, some which were under investigation by Defense Units as she spoke. It hadn't been an easy task getting the objects out of the McCullen residence, as Death Eaters had shown up midway through the raid, including who appeared to be Mr. McCullen himself, who was currently being pursued by the Ministry, No casualties had been suffered on either side, but it was unfortunate that the Dark Lord's supporters had all Disapparated out before they could be captured.
This had all gone on four hours before at three AM. It was easy to see why Lily was tired and spacey, even if Stern was not.
But at least her report appeased him, as he nodded curtly in approval and then flicked his wand towards the massive chalkboard next to him, where the facts of the case appeared instantly. It dawned on Lily, as she looked at them rather groggily, that he already knew everything he'd asked of her, and had probably just demanded she recite them to either get her attention or embarrass and bully her. She couldn't be certain of either being the complete, honest answer.
She paid close attention for the remainder of the meeting, however, if that had been his intention, or at least as close as her sleep-deprived mind would let her. Once or twice Moody had to prod her with a sharp finger to keep her from drifting off into peaceful relaxation, but she caught the gist of the briefing and jotted down the important things to check at a later date. In all, it was nothing she hadn't heard before. Increased sightings of Inferi. More muggle slayings. The names of familiar You-Know-Who supporters dropped about freely, questioning their involvement in the latest failed attack on the Ministry. The one thing that caught her attention, really caught her attention, was the mention that the group of Aurors keeping tabs on Regulus Black had suddenly lost their trail. He'd vanished, it seemed. Had he finally left the Black home, gone the way of McCullen and joined other You-Know-Who supporters at another location? With a warrant out for his arrest in involvement with the attack on the Ministry, it was imperative they find him.
For the first time in years, literal years, Lily thought briefly of Sirius Black and what he'd have to say to the accusations his brother was facing. Probably that they were right and Sirius himself would turn the key to lock Regulus in his cell in Azkaban. The thought made her smile.
The meeting disbanded at a quarter to noon (so much for a briefing being 'brief'), and with coffee on her mind, Lily gathered her many scrolls of parchment in her arms and headed back to her cubicle, noting with some warmth that the brass plaque reading "Auror Headquarters" was tilted to one side, as always. Paper airplanes containing Interdepartmental Ministry memos zoomed in and out of cubicles at an alarming rate, one even becoming lodged in her hair, which she freed the second she unloaded her paperwork across her desk and released the struggling, flimsy thing back into the air. She had full intentions of heading right to the break room for a steaming cup of coffee, but those thoughts were put on halt as she noted the collection of memos on her desk. Coffee would have to wait.
The first three were the summarized notes of meetings, including the one she had just exited. How did they do it? How were some people so productive when she herself was lagging and barely getting through the day? Another was a report from the Misuse of Muggle Artifacts office, informing her that one of the vases they had been investigating from the McCullen raid had turned one of their workers a rather nasty shade of green and had him vomiting profusely, so the report would take longer than expected. Lily sunk heavily into her worn desk chair at that. Stern was going to have a field day.
That last was the best of them all, a memo that actually made her smile, as it had been used for personal purposes and not business, something the Ministry frowned upon severely, not that it had ever stopped her before. The pale violent paper revealed the neat and tidy print of her closest friend at the Ministry, Ellie Harrison, who worked in the Daily Prophet branch, along with a newspaper clipping with the next day's date on it. It was clearly a sneak preview. The picture underneath the heading ("Wedding of the Century") was that of Lily with, as the massive rock on her left finger revealed, her fiancé at her side.
Even the Minister is getting in on the wedding fever!
Yesterday, questioned on her thoughts of her Senior Undersecretary, Ryan Ackermann's, engagement to up-and-coming Auror Lily Evans, the Minister expressed her approval. "I've dined with Ryan and Lily on several occasions. She's very bright, has a great future ahead of her, and they make a lovely couple," Bagnold said, sounding very much like a proud mother. "She's done great things for the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, and Ryan has done great things for the Ministry. It's a wonderful union."
Ackerman, twenty-three, and Evans, twenty-one, announced their engagement last fall at the Ministry Banquet, and since then rumors of their wedding have been circulating—
Lily stopped reading. Resting her forehead in the palm of her hands, she shuffled to Ellie's note.
Thought you might like to see the finished result. Or not.
Things are slow here today, how is it in your department?
Drinks at the Leaky Cauldron after work? I'll even buy.
xxx Ellie
P.S. Note the sunshine in the windows—Diane in Magical Maintenance had her baby!
Half-heartedly, Lily glanced over her shoulder, past the rows of bustling cubicles to the windows adorning the far wall, where, sure enough, sunlight poured in on those cubicles fortunate enough to be close. A mother of two herself, it was just like Ellie to be in the know about other people's pregnancies. Lily had no idea who Diane even was, but the sunshine was appreciated. The previous week had been wracked with nothing but rain and more rain, the Magical Maintenance's homage to the real rain outdoors. Scrawling a response, confirming the plans for drinks in handwriting that was nowhere near as tidy as Ellie's, Lily gave her wand a flick and the airplane folded itself and took off. She'd just raised herself up again and tucked her wand away, thoughts of coffee once again dancing in her weary head, but she'd barely taken a step when—
"Evans!"
Not again.
It was Moody this time, blessed Alastor Moody, and she knew it before even turning around, the tinny stumping of his metal leg unmistakable on the wooden floor. She had trained under him before becoming a licensed Auror, and while she rather liked the gruff old man, he put her constantly on edge as well. She acknowledged his presence as he came with a slight inclination of her head, never sure what to call him. "Alastor" was far too informal for a man of his rank. "Moody" didn't seem respectful enough. "Sir," as she called Stern, sounded foolish to her own ears. So he called her Evans, she called him nothing, and it worked out just fine.
"Ruddy leg…" he grumbled under his breath as he approached, and Lily attempted a sympathetic smile she knew was lost on him. Rubbing the joint where his leg met metal, he thrust an envelope into her hands abruptly, nearly causing her to drop it. "Here. I would have sent it Interdepartmentally, but it wouldn't fly. Too heavy. And I figured I'd…RSVP for this…engagement party of yours in person." He said "engagement party" in the same way he often mentioned supporters of You-Know-Who—as if it was a dark and dangerous subject that needed to be stamped out at the nearest possible date.
"You'll come?"
"I'll be there with bells on."
The thought of Moody, in his finest dress robes, toasting to her engagement, was so absurd that Lily laughed aloud, and even he saw the humor in it and flashed a rare twist of a grin.
"New recruits begin training next week," he went on, suddenly all business again, in a tone harsher than usual, maybe to make up for the fleeting show of affection, "And we've got one who requested you specially. His info."
Startled out of her amused thoughts of Moody draped in bell-ridden velvet robes, Lily glanced down at the folder still sitting in her hands, confused and excited all in one conflicted emotion. Who on earth would personally request to be trained by her? She'd only had her license for a good two years and had never trained any of the new Aurors to join the ranks, that duty left up to the Aurors with more seniority. Her stomach gave a queer little squirm of nerves as she pulled back the cover of the 'confidential' stamped folder, to find a very official-looking document, complete with Ministry seal. Clipped to that document was a photograph of James Potter, grinning up at her in his usual asinine way.
Lily nearly dropped the folder.
"Watch yourself, Evans!" Moody barked, her sudden movement startling even he, the most seasoned of Aurors. "What's gotten—"
"I am not training James Potter." It was a joke. Certainly it had to be a joke. However, as her eyes met Moody's, she realized that he was the last person to have an inkling of a sense of humor about a serious topic such as Auror training, and what little color her face had left quickly drained. "Of all the—the stupid, ridiculous, asinine—"
There she was, using her favorite adjective to describe him in a sentence. Already he was infiltrating her thoughts.
Moody didn't even inquire what her reasoning behind the outburst was, but cut her off with a swift movement of his gnarled hand, a method he'd often used in her training, and shook his head. "Enough. You'll train him or you'll forfeit your job. You know of Potter's Ministry connections. He went to the Minister herself for his request, and if you refuse—"
It was another sentence that would go unfinished, as Lily, all respect and formalities aside, cut him off once again. "But his Quidditch career," she persisted, trying to hand the folder back to Moody, who blatantly ignored her attempts. "I mean, wasn't he playing for Puddlemere United just last year? He couldn't possibly already be ready for training, even if he quit and began learning right away, it isn't—"
"Enough, Evans." For the second time that day, Lily felt very much as if she were a schoolgirl being scolded as Moody glared at her, his teeth ground together in an irritated grit. The man had little patience, and it did not extend to things as foolish as her panicked ramblings. "The boy has Ministry connections." Again, he said "Ministry connections" as though they were a dark and dangerous thing, and it could not have been more evident that he did not approve. "This Potter—" again, said in such a manner, "has requested you and you'll have to make due. From what I've heard, he resigned from Puddlemere. Don't blame him myself. Rubbish team."
Dizzily, in the back of her mind, Lily wondered when Alastor Moody had started following Quidditch.
"Like I said. Make due or be out of a job. I'll see you at the three o'clock briefing." Apparently thoroughly satisfied with having rocked her world to the core, Moody left Lily to deal with the consequences of his news, stumping away towards his own cubicle.
The redhead collapsed in her desk chair, clutching the confidential folder for dear life, although when she realized she was doing so tossed it onto her desk as if it were contagious. And really, it was. It had just contaminated her perfect existence and carefully crafted life she had built since her disastrous last encounter with James Potter.
Since when had there been a three o'clock briefing?
And what on earth was she going to do?