Hogwarts by the Horns

Part 1

1

To The Grounds

Lily Evans was only half listening to Professor Slughorn's lecture as he waddled around the front of the classroom. For some reason she couldn't concentrate on her classes. She found even the slightest things, like a small spider spinning a web in one of the miniscule windows of the potions room, distracted her from the lesson. She was restless and wanted nothing more than to hear the bell that would release her from the cold dungeon.

"Lily," hissed a voice beside her.

She turned toward her best friend, Ainsley Auldsworth, and raised her eyebrows questioningly.

"Are you going to take notes at all?" asked the blond girl, looking surprised. "Slughorn just said we were going to have a test on this next week."

With a little start, Lily looked down at her scarce annotations. She'd fallen very far behind in the lesson and realized with a jolt that her quill wasn't even in her hand. She snatched it up and immediately started writing whatever she could remember as Ainsley helpfully slid her own notes over for her to copy from. Annoyed with herself, she roughly brushed her dark red hair out of the way of her eyes as she poured over the parchment.

She tried to pay closer attention to the rest of the lecture and, once the bell rang at last, she begged Ainsley for her notes to make sure she hadn't missed anything.

"Sure," said the blond as she distractedly handed over the paper covered in her bubbly handwriting.

Lily glance up into the taller girl's face and saw Ainsley was staring at the backs of four boys moving with the crowd through the hall in front of them. The familiar dark heads of Potter and Black bobbed within the mass of bodies and Pettigrew's mousy-brown hair was just visible at Black's shoulder. However, Lily knew very well the only one Ainsley was interested in was the boy on the other side of Peter: her boyfriend, Remus Lupin.

"I'm going to go talk to Remus, okay?" said Ainsley, throwing her school bag over her shoulder. "I'll see you in a bit for dinner."

"Alright," Lily replied, "but don't get caught snogging in the library again!"

The joke did little to help the unusually serious look on Ainsley's face as she trotted up to her boyfriend and pulled him away from his three friends.

Lily had no more classes after potions, and her brain had proven its lack luster interest in schoolwork many times over that day, so she headed for the grounds, her muscles craving movement. The closest exit led into the courtyard. Once outside, she sucked in a clearing breath of fresh air that chilled her nose and throat. Fall was settling gradually into winter in the mountains and it cut smoothly through her muddled thoughts, wiping them away for the time being.

Blissfully letting go of how many assignments she had to complete that week, the next Prefect assembly, and most important, avoiding another meeting with McGonagall about her classes, she stuffed her hands in her pockets and walked over the lawn of the courtyard. She aimed straight ahead for the opening onto the grounds. As the sun dropped a little lower in the sky, she strolled past the lake and waved to Hagrid on the far bank. She was just turning back to find Ainsley for dinner when she saw one of her roommates, Jessica Gable, scurrying toward the same entrance she was headed for.

"Oh! Hi, Lil," greeted the beautiful girl, tossing back her rich blond locks. "You'll never guess what I've just heard."

"In all the years I've shared a room with you, I've never been able to guess what's about to come out of your mouth," Lily said, smiling wryly.

Jessica giggled mischievously, obviously flattered to no end by the remark. She was one of the biggest gossips at Hogwarts and was never without some snippet of new information. She was by no means the brightest girl in Gryffindor when it came to books or spells, but she could keep an audience of her peers rapt for hours with what she knew about the inhabitants of the castle.

"Well, I passed Deena Muller on her way to the Great Hall," Jessica began, talking in a low voice, "apparently that diet of hers is off, because she looks heavier than ever, but she stopped for a minute to tell me about the woes of her roommate."

They entered the warmth of the castle together and walked down the corridor.

"What now? Has Rona decided to leave school and join the Death Eaters a little early?" Lily grumbled before she could stop herself. She never had liked many of the Slytherin girls – they all seemed to be going the same way as their boyfriends and housemates.

"No, no, her other roommate, Cassie Block," Jessica told her, gliding over Lily's bitter comment. "You know…Sirius's girlfriend."

"It just kills you to even say it, doesn't it?" Lily teased her. While Jessica might know everything about everyone, there was one thing they all knew about her as well – she was nauseatingly in love with Sirius Black, and thus hated every one of his girlfriends. When Ainsley dated him for about a month in fourth year, she and Jessica had fought constantly.

"Well, she's a Slytherin for Merlin's sake! What could he even see in her?" Jessica blurted. "But anyway, Deena says their fighting again – worse than ever, actually. She says this may finally be the end of him and that hussy. And here I was, worried that they were getting serious!" She sounded giddy in her relief. "I should have given my lad more credit."

"Well, I hope it works out for you this time," Lily said.

Jessica gave her a bright white smile and squeezed her arm in thanks. "I've got to go make myself beautiful before he comes back to the common room. I want him to see what he's missing as long as he's with that crazy girl."

Lily paused for a second and gazed after her roommate hurrying off in the direction of the Gryffindor tower. She had long legs, a gorgeous hourglass-shaped figure, and hair that did exactly what it was told to do. Lily felt a slight pang of jealousy at the thought, but she was sure Jessica would indeed be able to make herself even more beautiful before dinner was over. Lily didn't even have a chance to put on make-up most days. Keeping up with her Head Girl duties and trying to prepare for N.E.W.T.S. took up the majority of her free time and she chose to get a few more minutes sleep rather than make herself pretty every morning.

With a small sigh, she headed for the Great Hall again. However, she didn't get far before she came upon two more of her roommates. Blakeley Barron was walking beside a very unhappy Ainsley, and when the tall black girl spotted Lily she looked immensely relieved.

"We've been looking for you," she said quietly. "Ainsley and Lupin just broke up."

Lily actually gasped and looked into Ainsley's pinched face. Tears were rolling silently down her cheeks, but she wouldn't be able to hold it in for long. The redhead put her arm around her friend's shoulders and guided her and Blakeley to the only refuge she could think of where they could talk uninterrupted: back to the grounds.