Vires Mentis
By Faolchu

I

"I am implored to remind you, that there will be several newly instated rules this year…"

Sitting at the end of the long oak Gryffindor table, James took no notice of the speaker. Rather, he took it upon himself to study the golden goblet in front of him. A grave silence hovered over him and his friends.

"Students are to remain on school grounds at all times, the Forbidden Forest is, as it always has been; forbidden. .."

Any other year, the Marauders would have been using this time to formulate new pranks and carve new ideas after their long summers apart. They were detached from the Great Hall, living, for the moment, in their own minds. The general feeling of the Great Hall was that of excitement, the young witches and wizards were all hungry for the feast. Friends chatted quietly throughout the Headmaster's speech, oblivious to its subdued nature.

"Trips to Hogsmeade will be limited to a few occasions over the following terms…"

There was a chip in his goblet, at the surface of the rim. James wondered if he should tell the house elves in the morning. Maybe score some food before getting to his Head Boy Duties. Head Boy. It was a running joke between himself and Sirius since it arrived over the summer. Who in their right mind would make him Head Boy? Then the grim realization dawned on him.

"For a full view of the new regulations, please consult the DWARF list, found on the second floor in the left hand corridor…"

He was barely listening, the conversation between himself and Albus Dumbledore over the summer kept cropping up, and with it all the events preceding it. The Headmaster's old face had looked haggard, the candlelight's shadow exaggerating the wrinkles. Blue eyes seeing through him, the words, so softly spoken…

No.

James did not care for the broken down image of the greatest wizard of their age, or for their discussion that night.

The slight jostle from Sirius at his right brought him back to the present. The food had appeared and people had begun to tuck in.

James mechanically served himself some mashed potatoes, carefully avoiding Remus' concerning stare. Of course his closest friends knew about his change in mood, and the cause of it. If only partially. Damn, James thought, he couldn't let them worry about him. He needed to get back to being the old James they all loved.

Well, he would get right on that…starting tomorrow.

Sirius would be harder to hide from. James could tell he had gotten off easily on the train ride up. No excessive questioning, disbelieving looks, or obvious statements. Just a hard, knowing stare from his best friend. A promise of discussions to be had later. James was thankful, words didn't need to be exchanged, just a tacit understanding.

He would have to provide answers to the questions that would inevitably come.

Reaching for another dish, just to do something with his hands, James caught a glimpse of red hair. A small smile leaked out at the memory of her state on the train. He noticed she had done nothing to tame her wild hair for the feast.

Then it all came crashing down on him. The expectations, the responsibility, his circumstances.

No, he couldn't afford to act like a child anymore.

Huffing in indignation, James proceeded to move his food around on his plate, in the highly prized art of making it look like he'd eaten more than he actually did be spreading food over the entirely of his plate.

Childish indeed.

Damn, he'd have to work on that too.

But, looking over at a certain red head, he thought, there are exceptions to every rule.

Lily was not having a good day.

She had hoped that it would be better than her terrible summer. No such luck.

What a bummer.

It had started out alright. The knowledge that she would be back on the train to Hogwarts and far away from her sister and her condescending behaviour had lifted her spirits. She had even put on her favourite muggle outfit to wear.

It all went downhill when it started to rain. Now, being a Londoner, she had grown accustomed to the sometimes daily drizzle. But this was no light spattering of rain, it was a full on torrent of water.

As it happened, her father's car broke down half way to Kings Cross. Having to face the elements, Lily was then forced to continue on alone, while her father waited for the tow. Now thoroughly drenched, hair plastered to the sides of her face, she staggered on to the next bus to Kings Cross.

She rushed to get through the barrier and on to the platform on time while lugging her gigantic trunk behind her, looking like a drowned cat. She had just managed to board the train. She quickly made her way to the prefects compartments, deciding to meet up with Erin later.

Only to find that James Potter had been made Head Boy. Someone she would have to share her duties with all year long. She wasn't surprised that he didn't make any juvenile comments to her about her appearance or lack of punctuality because her face screamed murder. Dropping her things in the middle of the enlarged compartment, she scrutinized the prefects who were no doubt waiting for her or James to say something.

So she had made a rushed speech about the new regulations and rules that needed to be enforced (having memorized it a fortnight ago), while Potter just stood there and showed everyone exactly how useful he was.

The meeting dragged on, but was finally over. The prefects cleared out and then she was forced to remain in the company of Potter till they arrived at Hogwarts.

Lily felt damp, tired and was anxious about spending any time at all with one of the biggest prats in the UK. A quick drying charm and a trusty hair elastic later she was prepared to be anti-social. Lily pulled her bag down ready to read one of the several muggle books she had brought with her. Only to find her bag drenched and its contents…

"You have got to be joking!" Lily's uncharacteristically shrill voice filled the compartment.

A bad day? Scratch that, because it just became dreadful.

Her once beautiful books were now warped and soggy; bits of pages had left their tomes and decided to mush together like a number of oversized spit balls. Worse, her over the term homework she had intended to finish on the train ride had leaked its ink all over the contents of her bag.

Raising her eyes to the heavens as to ask why such an atrocity happened to her, Lily caught the eye of the other occupant of the compartment.

Potter was regarding her with a furrowed brow and a hint of a smile on his face.

He though her situation was funny?!

Lily opened her mouth to tell Mr. Superiority just what she thought of him when he did something unexpected.

"Scourgify."

Immediately, her things were dry and no ink remained on her items. Her books unfortunately remained disfigured.

"Sorry bout that," Potter said, shrugging his shoulders and at the same time remaining at ease. "Don't know how to fix that up for you."

Lily couldn't decide if this was another cleverly planned Potter prank…but he seemed sincere. She decided to play it safe and gave him a shrug back. She studied the tattered book in her hands. Leafing through the pages, she found that it would be near impossible to repair. Lumps of pages seemed glued together and pieces here and there were missing.

She was startled again with the appearance of another book in her line of vision and she was forced to look up to see the hand that held it and Potter's grin.

"Here, it just so happens that I finished it this morning."

Not one to turn away any book, Lily hesitantly received the large tome.

"I know it's probably not what you'd prefer to read, but it is a novel…and, well, seeing as you have nothing else…"

Turning the book over, I noticed that the cover had seen some wear and tear, so much so that the title was almost illegible. Vires Mentis.

"Thank you." And she meant it. She looked up and smiled at Potter trying to convey what words could not. He seemed to understand, nodded, and pulled out a quill and parchment paper and began working.

Lily froze. This was very odd behaviour from Potter, where was the boisterous attitude, charming crooked grin, and pestering boy? She discretely scrutinized him. The summer had certainly been kind to him, he looked taller now, she didn't notice during the meeting. He was tanned, did he go somewhere warm? His hair was still hopeless, and it was almost too long, sweeping into his eyes. His clothes looked wrinkled and not in their usual pristine state. He was quietly working. Potter was—what?

Something was off. Lily flicked her eyes to the door. No sign of the stooges.

Gaining no more information from observation, Lily concluded that it was all she could do at the moment. Unless of course she talked to him. And ruin the glorious silence he had allowed her? HA! Fat chance of that happening! Still determined to get to the bottom of why Potter was under the imperius curse (for what else could illicit such strange behaviour?) she brushed it off for the time being.

She opened the book and caught herself before turning the first page. There, written in the upper left corner a name was scrawled: Harold Anthony Potter.

His father, maybe? Lily didn't know much about his family. Grandfather? Cousin?

Who cares, this is Potter remember? The need to know lingered, and Lily knew exactly how to shake it off.

Wasting no more time, she dove head first into its pages.

***

"Lily, since when did Potter become so interesting?"

Whipping her head round, Lily was met with a suspicious look.

"Since he started to not be himself." Lily answered casually.

"Right, this has nothing to do with the fact that he's grown since last year? Or that he has been deemed fit to carry the responsibility of being Head Boy?"

Erin said all of this in a light, disbelieving tone as she tended to her rather full dinner plate.

"On the train, several girls in sixth year were of the same opinion: Potter looks quite dashing with the badge pinned to his breast. Does he not?"

There, a quirk of a smile.

Lily grinned, "Only if you're into blokes with ego inflated heads and a penchant for idiocy."

Erin laughed and swept her long brown hair out of her face. "It seems to be the desired type at Hogwarts."

Erin and Lily had been friends since second year. And even after all this time, Lily found it hard to read her best friend. Erin wasn't one to wear her emotions on her face, preferring to sport a calm and cool visage in any situation. Lily liked to think that she could read her better than anyone else. But sometimes, she wasn't so sure.

Lily was in fact very bad at hiding what her feelings were. Lying was definitely not something she could do easily. She didn't know what her feelings were towards this apparent change in Potter, but she couldn't care less at the moment. It was a great improvement, but Lily wondered if it would actually last.

Deciding to change the subject, Lily asked her about her trip over the summer. Erin had traveled to Australia to visit her family and her already bronzed skin was even darker.

"Grandma Phyllis was a riot; she was under the impression that I was hired labour while we stayed at her house, she kept asking me if I was going to start painting the spare bedroom." Erin's grandmother, Phyllis Kelly, had been a highly respected Curse-Breaker in her day. Until one day a backfiring curse addled her brain. She tended to make up reasons for the visitors to her home because she couldn't remember them most days.

"You know my Dad works at the Ministry there, it's a lot like the one here, but it's right next to the ocean. Dad's office has a window right next to the reef! And it was the dry season, so no rain! I wish you could have come."

And here was one of the main reasons that Lily's summer was so unpleasant. With Erin more than one continent away, owls were few and far between. With her parents working and her best friend gone, Lily had to cram as much as she could into the two letters that she wrote.

"Yeah, that would have been great." Lily tried to keep her tone neutral.

She had asked her parents if she could go and after a lot of begging, they had agreed. But the practical side of Lily wouldn't allow it. While her friend may be well off, Lily, being a muggleborn did not have a whole lot of wizard money. And if she wanted to become a healer, she needed to pay for further schooling. She needed the summer to work.

The students were now making their way to their respective dormitories. Lily and Erin among them, until she came face to face with Potter.

"Miss Kelly, Miss Evans."

"See you tomorrow Lily! Play nice!" And with no more than an evil cackle, Erin departed.

Which left her and Potter alone in the Great Hall, save for the old wizard walking towards them, his half moon spectacles glinting in the candlelight.

"Perfect. I trust that you both made acquaintances on the train?"

Both Heads held a carefully blank expression.

"Good, good. Now, I'm afraid you will have to follow me, there are some things that cannot wait for the morning."

DWARF Decree of Wizardry Alchemy Regulations and Fundamentals

I would love to hear your comments. Constructive criticism and questions are welcome.