Lilly and James and the book of Darkness

by Cookie

It you get through this story I will be amazed :)

Lily and James and the Book of Darkness

By Autumn Cutter

Chapters:

1. James Sirius Remus and Peter-page 1

2. Hogwarts-page 6

3. Potions with Professor Black-page 10

4. Hagrid-page 15

5. The Challenge-page 17

6. The Kiss-page 18

7. The Wizard's Duel-page 21

8. Flying lessons-page 23

9. Where's Remus?-page 25

10. Detention-page 27

11. Voldemort and the Quidditch Match-page 32

12. A shocking surprise-page 40

13. Gone!-page 42

14. The Warning-page 44

15. The Nightmare-page 47

16. Back to Hogwarts-page 48

17. Mawang Lantalino!-page 52

18. The Letter-page 55

19. Jokers Forever!-page 59

20. The Water Catastrophe-page 59

21. Hogsmeade-page 61

22. The Bad Day-page 65

23. The Necklace of Erised (*l:)-page 70

24. Happy New Years!-page 73

25. Saving the Innocent-page 82

26. The end-86

James, Sirius, Remus and Peter

"Bye mom. Bye dad." Lily kissed her parents and ran through the barrier. "Wow." She whispered. Lily hadn't known that she had been a witch until she got the letter. Her sister Petunia didn't seem to be to pleased. Lily knew that Petunia didn't want to go, she just thought that Lily was a freak. For a while, Lily had thought that she was a freak too, and she almost didn't come to this "Hogwarts" place. She had cried herself to sleep the last couple of nights, thinking she was different. But today her parents had finally talked her into going to Hogwarts. She hadn't expected so many people to be there! Her old school was a private school, and there were very few who went to it. But this! She had always felt that she had been different from everyone else and when she got the letter she knew she was right. But these people were her people. These people were all witches and wizards. She wasn't different from them and she started thinking, maybe coming here wasn't such a bad idea after all. She started heading towards the train when she accidentally bumped into someone, and the papers he was holding scattered all over the floor. She bent to pick one up. Lily looked up to see who she had bumped into. A boy, about her age with black hair that was untidy in the back and bright blue eyes was looking back at her. She quickly looked down again and handed him the paper she had picked up. "Sorry." She muttered.

"It's ok." He muttered back.

Lily stood up and brushed herself off. She attempted to pick up her heavy trunk so that she could take it onto the train, but she couldn't. "Need some help?" the boy asked.

"Yes please." She replied. She was a little intimidated by this boy. Almost no one was ever this nice to her. The boy set his papers on top of the trunk and lifted up the other end. "Watch out for that step." Lily said to the boy, who was backward and couldn't see where he was going. Finally, after much grunting and groaning, the trunk was lifted onto the train and set with the luggage.

"What do you have in there, bricks?" The boy asked, breathless, leaning against a seat, with a slight smile. Lily blushed.

"All my Hogwarts books. I like to read so I brought a few others as well." She returned the smile. Lily sat down on a train seat, and to her great surprise the boy sat next to her.

"You don't mind if I sit here, do you?"

"No, not at all."

"By the way, my name's James. James Potter." He extended a hand and Lily took it.

"I'm Lily Smith."

"So what year are you in? I can't tell. You look young, but you're pretty tall."

"I'm going to be in my first year. And you?"

"Same. I wonder what house I'm in. I mean, no one really knows until they get sorted, but still, my whole family was in Gryffindor, so I think that's where I'll be. But I did have a grandpa that was in Ravenclaw, so I can't be exactly sure. What house do you think you'll be in?"

"House?" Lily asked, confused. She wished she could have sounded smarter.

"Yah. You know. The place you live in until you get out of Hogwarts." He looked at her and added softly, "Are you the first witch in your family?" Lily, embarrassed, looked down at her lap and nodded. "That's ok. There's a lot of people here that come from muggle families." He replied.

"What's a muggle?" she asked. "People that can't do magic." He said simply. Lily was about to ask him what the different houses were when two more boys entered their car.

One was tall and scraggly, with almost waxy like skin and black hair, and the other was shorter, but no too short, with grayish blonde hair and a smile.

"Hello James!" said the boy with the grayish blonde hair.

"Remus! Sirius! Hi!" James replied, excited.

"Who's this? The boy named Sirius asked, looking over Remus's shoulder at Lily.

"This is Lily Smith." James said, smiling. "Lily, this is Remus Lupin," he pointed toward the boy with the gray blonde hair, "and Sirius Black." James said, pointing to the other boy.

"Oh! I get it! James has got a girlfriend!" Sirius started chanting. Lily blushed horribly.

"She's not my girlfriend." James stepped in. "She needed help with her trunk and I helped her and then I just happened to sit down next to her." Sirius sniggered and Remus hid his face, obviously trying to stop laughing. James sighed, rolled his eyes and turned to Lily. "When ever I even get close to a girl, they're sure that she is my girlfriend. I'm really sorry. Just ignore these freaks." In the meantime, Sirius and Remus had sat on the train seat across from them, Sirius almost in tears from laughing so hard.

Before they knew it, the train door opened yet again and a short, pudgy boy came in with a tear stricken face.

"What's wrong?" Lily asked, truly concerned.

"My - My parents j-just died in a b-broomstick a-a-accident!" The boy said between sobs. After saying, "accident" he completely broke down. He fell onto his knees in the middle of the aisle and continued sobbing. Lily got up and stepped in front of James, finally getting into the aisle. She helped the boy up to his feet and sat him down on the seat behind James. "Are you all right?" She asked him, and the boy shook his head in answer. "What's your name?" She asked, hoping to get him to talk. "P-Peter P-P-Pettigrew!" He whined. Lily patted him on the back and tried to comfort him. Before long the boy had lay down on the seat and had fallen asleep crying. Lily stood back up and sat down next to James. "Poor boy." James muttered. Sirius and Remus had stopped laughing and they nodded their heads solemnly in reply. Lily sighed and looked around. Everyone in this compartment was different from regular people, but the same with each other. They were something different. They could do magic and pretty soon, she would be able to too. Her heart gave a great leap as the train's wheels started grinding on the tracks and they were moving forward.

The train ride was turning out to be longer than Lily had expected. She started to get hungry. Very hungry. So she almost jumped out of her seat when a witch with black robes on came into their compartment with at tray full of food. Luckily, she contained herself and dug around in her pockets for some wizard money. She pulled out 3 galleons, 9 sickles and22 knuts. She handed them to the witch and she in turn gave her 3 pumpkin pasties, 3 chocolate frogs, and2 bags of Bertie Botts every flavor beans. James looked at the bag of Bertie Botts every flavor beans wearily.

"You'll want to be careful with those. When they say every flavor, they mean every flavor. I think I got a vomit one once."

"Eew!" Lily cried out in disgust.

"I haven't been able to eat them since."

"I got one once that tasted like boogers. I haven't been able to eat them since either." Remus piped up. They all laughed, all except Peter, who was still asleep on the train seat behind them. Lily, smiling, looked out her window and lost her breath. In front of them loomed a monstrous castle. "Oh my dear lord." She said under her breath. James, seeing the expression on Lily's face, grinned.

"Welcome to Hogwarts!"

"It's huge!" Lily almost shrieked, not understanding why these three odd boys weren't getting excited.

"Should we wake him up?" James jerked his head towards Peter.

"We probably should." Lily stood up, painfully taking her eyes off Hogwarts. She walked over to Peter. "Wake up." She said, gently shaking the boy. He moaned and looked up at her, then said,

"Momma!" And burst into tears again. He threw his arms around Lily's neck, nearly strangling her. Lily, not knowing what to do, patted Peter on the back. Lily tried to standup but Peter wouldn't let go. He fell off the seat, arms still around her, and his knees hit the floor with a painful THUD! Lily looked over to James, and he obviously got what she was trying to tell him. He got up and helped to Peter to his feet.

"Peter, we're here. We're at Hogwarts." Peter sniffed, than looked out the window. He sniffed again.

"So?"

"So!? Good lord boy, we have to get off the train and get sorted!"

"I-I d-don't wanna!" Peter said between sobs. James looked over Peter at Sirius and jerked his head toward Peter. Sirius nodded and he and Remus came over and helped Peter stay standing. They helped him take his first few steps, and when they finally thought he could manage, they let go. His knees wobbled and he started to collapse, but Remus and Sirius picked him up again. They ended up helping him all the way off the train.

"Firs' years this way!" A bellowing voice that seeped into Lily's heart came from a humongous man. A small first year was standing next to the big man, and it seemed as if the man was about 2, no 3 times bigger than the boy. Lily looked over to James, expecting to see his I-know-who-this-is look in his eye, and was quite surprised to see his mouth wide open and his eyes wide.

"Who is he?" He sounded shocked. Remus propped Peter up against the train and walked over to James.

"I heard about him from my brothers. His name's Hagrid. He's the game keeper here at Hogwarts."

"Well, whoever he is, he's huge!" James cried in reply, still goggling at the man. Remus stifled a laugh.

"I hear he's supposed to be pretty nice." He said. They walked over to Hagrid, partly because he was calling all the first years, partly because they wanted to see if he was really as big as he seemed. Getting closer to Hagrid did not change his size. If anything, he got larger!

"Hello there!" He called to them. "Into the boats ya' go! Only 4 or 5 to a boat please. Only 4 or 5 to a boat!" So Lily, Remus, James, and Sirius, (who was carrying Peter,) got into the same boat.

After what seemed like forever, Hagrid yelled, "Alright, y'all. Now row! Row! Row!" He kept the beat with his sturdy voice. Peter's head was on Lily's lap, James and Remus were rowing, and Sirius was dabbing Peter's head with a handkerchief he had dipped into the water. "Duck everyone! There's some low stalactite right ahead!" Sure enough, when Lily looked up they were entering a cave with huge stalactites hanging over head. She ducked her head down, bending her neck painfully. Sirius moved off his seat and sat down on the bottom of the boat, closer to Lily and Peter, still dabbing Peter's forehead. "How's he holding up?" James asked. "I think he fell asleep again. Lily, why don't you come over here and sit next to me, so Peter can have the bench." Sirius replied. Lily, obeying Sirius's request, went and sat down next to him. Peter didn't even stir. It was long moments before Lily's boat finally emerged from the cave, doused into moonlight the moment they did. Straight-ahead was Hogwarts. Even closer was land. Before long, they had reached the shore, gotten out of their boat and were following Hagrid up the steps to Hogwarts. Peter had woken up, but Remus was still helping him stay standing. Finally, they reached the door of the huge castle. Hagrid reached up with his gigantic fist and knocked on the door.

Hogwarts

It immediately swung open and in the door stood a stern looking woman. The woman had black hair tied back in a bun and looked to be in her late 20's or early 30's. "Hello, and welcome to Hogwarts." She greeted them while gesturing them inside. "I am Professor McGongall, the Transfiguration teacher. Please wait here until I return." And with that she walked off one of the many corridors. Lily looked around for Hagrid and noticed that he too had gone.

"What exactly do we have to do?" She whispered to James.

"Don't have a clue. My brothers told me it's really painful though."

"P-painful?" She whimpered, her body tensing

"Yah, but they're really big jokers. I'm sure they're lying." Lily sighed and relaxed. James laughed, but abruptly stopped when Professor McGongall came back into the room carrying a stool with a ragged old hat on it.

"Into a single file line, please! Everyone into a single file line!" She called. James got in front of Lily, Remus and then Peter were behind her, and Sirius was in front of James. "Now into the dining room, please! Follow me!" Professor McGongall yelled. Lily tried to swallow, but it was too hard. Before she knew what has happening, her feet were also moving, and she too was heading into the dining room.

"Woh!" She heard James whisper.

"What?"

"Look at the ceiling!" Lily looked up and realized that there was no ceiling.

"Ceiling? What ceiling?"

"Actually, there really is a ceiling, it's just enchanted to look like the sky. I read about it in Everything you want to know about Hogwarts." Came Remus's voice from behind her. Lily found this very hard to believe.

"When I call your name you will come up to the stool, sit down and try on the hat. After the hat says where you will be please sit at your table." Professor McGongall called over the chatting of the school. "Austin, Dan!" She called. He sat down and waited. It was a good few minutes before the hat finally called out his house name.

"Ravenclaw!"

He went and sat down at an applauding table. Next was Alley, Crystal! Who became the first Gryffindor, then Brown, Steve became a Slytherien, then a Blue, Kathy became a Huffelpuff. And then, "Black, Sirius!" Sirius gulped, stepped out of line, and went up to the stool. He placed the hat on his head and it almost immediately decided his house.

"GRYFFINDOR!"

Many others were called up until finally Professor McGongall yelled, "Lupin, Remus!" Remus ran up to the stool rather excitedly and placed the hat on his head. It was a long while before the hat finally started stuttering an answer.

"R-R-Raven"

Not Ravenclaw, Gryffindor! Lily thought. At least then he can be with Sirius! And much to her amazement, the hat stopped trying to stutter Ravenclaw.

"GRYFFINDOR!"

Remus jumped with surprise and then ran over to Sirius and gave him a high five. She stood waiting patiently, her ears perking up when "Pettigrew, Peter!" Was called. James escorted Peter to the chair, sat him down and placed the hat on his head. A few people started laughing. James shot the "few" people who had been laughing (who had all been Slytheriens,) a furious glance so cold that it made them not only stop laughing but look away so that they couldn't see James anymore. James walked back to line and as soon as he did the hat started yelling it's decision. "Slyther- Slytheri- Slytherie- GRYFFINDOR!"

James ran over to Peter, helped him up and walked him to the Gryffindor table, sat him down, walked back to the line, only to be the next to go up to the stool and place the hat on his head when his name was called.

"GRYFFINDOR!"

People kept coming up, trying on the hat, and then sitting down at their table. It seemed to Lily like it had been years before finally, "Smith, Lily!" She nervously walked up to the stool and put the hat on. It covered her eyes well and she could no longer see anything but the blackness of the inside of the hat.

"Well, what a wonderful mind! A WONDERFUL, WONDERFUL mind." A little voice said in her ear. "Obviously a Ravenclaw!" Not Ravenclaw! GRYFFINDOR! I want to be with James and Sirius and Peter and Remus! She thought. "Not Ravenclaw?" The voice said. "Are you absolutely sure? Well alright, what was it? Gryffindor? Are you positive? Ok… GRYFFINDOR!" Remus, James, and Sirius all stood to clap, and Peter probably would have too, if he could stand. Lily, very content, went and sat down next to James. She looked to see who was going to get sorted next. "Snape, Severus!" Professor McGongall shouted. An incredibly mean looking boy stepped over to the stool and sat down, placing the hat on his head. Not even a second after the hat touched his head it started screaming as loud as it could.

"SLYTHERIEN! SLYTHERIEN!"

The boy simply smiled and sat down at a rough looking table of Slytheriens. Lily shivered, not out of excitement but out of fear of this boy. The boy looked her way. She flinched and turned around to face Remus who was sitting across from her. He had seen her flinch and was looking worried.

"Are you ok Lily?"

"Me? Yah I'm fine. Don't worry about me." Someone brushed her hair aside.

"He gives me the creeps too Lily, it's ok." It was James. She relaxed hearing the soothing sound of his voice. Lily nodded her head and reached for a buttered roll that had appeared on the plate in front of her.

~

That night Lily lay in her dormitory, thinking. Thinking about Hogwarts, thinking about magic, about her mom and dad, about James and Peter and Remus and Sirius and about the mean looking Slytherien. She rolled over and faced a girl named Crystal. Crystal was wide-awake also.

"Are you a muggle too?" Crystal whispered.

"Yes."

"Are you scared?"

"Yes."

"Me too."

The girl said no more but closed her eyes and rolled over, obviously trying to sleep. Lily rolled on to her back and sighed. Not even a whole day and I already miss my mom and dad. I am such a wimp! She thought to herself. Lily tried not to think about her parents but it was very difficult.

~

"So what do you guys think of Lily?" Sirius said, pulling his nightshirt on over his head.

"She's nice." Remus replied, pulling up the blankets. They were the last ones in the bedrooms and probably the last ones to go to sleep. In the room there was Peter's bed, then James's bed, then Sirius's bed and then Remus's. Peter had already fallen asleep, which astounded the boys seeing as he had slept so much on the train.

"I think she's really nice." James said.

"Of course you think she's really nice, she's your girlfriend!" Sirius retorted.

"She is not my girlfriend!

Sirius coughed while saying, "Yet." James didn't say anything, just blushed.

~

And in yet another part of the school, Severus Snape lay in the Slytherien boy's dormitory. There was an even number of boys and an odd number of beds, and so in the end Severus ended up being in a room by himself. But that didn't matter to him. He liked it that way. No snorers, no teeth grinders, no sleepwalkers or talkers. Just him. Him and his thoughts. Thoughts about James Potter. He had seen James sneer at the Slytheriens, making him and anyone who was his friend an enemy. Not that he liked any of the boys that James sneered at, but a Slytherien was a Slytherien. And right then and there, he vowed to make James's life as miserable as possible.

~

Potions with Professor Black

The next day at school, after breakfast Lily, Sirius, James, Remus and Peter, (who had finally stopped crying) walked through the hallways huddled together, trying to find their way.

"This way! I'm positive!"

"That doesn't show up on the map."

"Well sorry Mr. Lily lover."

"Shut up Sirius."

"Probably Peeves. I read about him in The ghosts of Hogwarts. He's a poltergeist."

"Pee what?"

"Peeves, Lily, Peeves. He plays tricks on the students here at Hogwarts."

"Oh."

"You guys! This corridor!"

"Which corridor, James? I don't see a corridor? AHH!!! A BROOMSTICK! CURSE IT! CURSE IT!"

"The corridor we just passed!"

"We passed two corridors, James, which one is it?'

"The one on the left Remus. Left, Lily! Left!

"This is left, James!"

"Well then go to your right!"

And so this went on until they FINALLY found their first class, which was potions with Professor Black. They walked in and much to their embarrassment realized they were the last ones to come into the class. They each had to take a seat in back, next to the Slytheriens that they were taking their lessons with. All the Slytheriens snickered when they entered. Snickered at everyone except for James, who they had grown to fear since the sorting.

"You're late." Professor Black sneered in their direction. "Detention for all of you!"

"Oh please Professor, we got lost it…" Lily started.

"I don't really care if you get lost or you died just be here on time! Do you have that straight?" Professor Black shrieked at them.

"Yes sir." They all said at the same time.

"It will never happen again professor." James added.

"Good. Now, today we are going to learn about shrinking potions. Please take out your unicorn horn and your newt eyes." Professor Black stood in the front of the classroom, not very patiently, while all the students found their ingredients. "Hurry up! We haven't all day, you know!" He yelled. Professor Black whirled around, his black cape sweeping him out of view momentarily. Lily noticed that Severus was sitting next to her.

"Are you a friend of James's?" Severus asked her.

"Yes."

"Do you like James?"

"As a friend?"

"Yeah, I guess."

"Yes."

"Does he like you?"

"I think."

"So you're friends?"

"Yes."

Severus sighed and sat back. Then he whispered, loud enough for anyone to hear, "Gosh, Professor Black sure is weird and mean, isn't he?" Professor Black whirled around.

"Who said that?" He shrieked. Severus pointed towards Lily.

"I didn't say…"

"You obviously did. Detention!"

"You already gave me detention!"

"Well then I think a trip to Dumbledore's office might do you some good."

"But Professor Black I didn't it was…"

"SILENCE! Now follow me." He turned toward the class. "And if I hear that even one person said anything, just a peep, you can just forget about having Friday afternoon off and start thinking about spending a whole evening cleaning my trophies, all of you clean all of them, one at a time. The class groaned. Professor Black shot a sharp look at them before heading Lily out the door.

~

"Poor Lily! That stupid old Professor Black! As soon as I can I'll kill him! Lily doesn't deserve that! She's too smart and good and…."

"So beautiful you want to kiss her?'

"I'm going to kill you too Sirius, so I would shut up if I were you." Sirius said no more. Peter started sobbing again.

"My Momma always did bad things and had to go the headmasters office! Just like Lily!"

"Lily didn't do anything. It was that…that….so called human Severus." Unfortunately, Severus did hear this.

"So called human? I'm more human than you and your friends will ever be." James couldn't tell why, but Remus suddenly went a little white.

"What do you have against Lily?"

"Stay out of this Remus. I have nothing against Lily except for the fact that she is one of James's friends."

"Well what do you have against me?"

"You act like a big shot, like you're the best one here and you try to make the Slytheriens scared of you. Shall I go on?"

"I do not!"

"Yes you do."

~

Sent to the headmaster's office on the first day of school! This must be a new record. Lily thought to herself sympathetically. They rounded the corner and came to a huge portrait of Dumbeldore himself. Professor Black walked right up to it.

"Sugar plum gumdrop." He said. To Lily's amazement the portrait swung open, revealing a set of spiraling stairs. She sniffed the air. It smelled of sulfur ash and bloodmoss. Down they went, down, down, down until finally, they reached the bottom, where there were three more portraits. The first one was of Hogwarts itself. The second one was a portrait of man, which happened to be Godric Gryffindor, or so it said on the sign. The third picture was very strange; it was of a big room. In the room was a desk, three chairs, various beakers and test tubes and…. Dumbeldore! She looked back to the one of Godric Gryffindor and noticed that he was scratching his ear! Lily took a step back, and then remembered that on the train James had told her that is what pictures do. She looked at the one of the office, and it looked like Dumbeldore was doing paperwork. Professor Black walked up to the portrait of the room, but didn't stop. He walked right through the portrait. When Lily looked at the portrait again, Professor Black was in it, gesturing her inside. She held her breath and stepped in. The effects were nothing like she thought would have happened. Lily was sure that there would have been color exploding and a sucking noise but no, it was just like walking through a door. Lily turned around. Where she had come through there was a portrait of the hallway where she had been standing in, obviously, the way out of Dumbeldore's office.

"Ah Lily. I had a feeling I would see you here today." Dumbeldore said. What's that supposed to mean? She thought to herself. She said nothing, just swallowed. "Professor Black, would you excuse us please?" Professor Black scowled at them dubiously and then left through the portrait. "Have a seat Lily, won't you?" Lily sat down.

"Professor Dumbeldore sir, I just want to say I didn't…"

"It's alright Lily. I know you didn't."

"How…?"

"Sometimes Lily my dear it's best not to ask." Lily shut her mouth. She felt it was the only thing to do. Dumbeldore rubbed his beard. "You seem to have a problem with Severus." Lily nodded her head. "I am not yet very good with these things, you know, but I do know someone who is. You should go see Hagrid. You can take off your lesson after lunch, which should be transfiguration. I will tell Minerva you will be gone." Lily searched her memory until she remembered who Hagrid was.

"Where does he live?" Lily asked.

"Just out of the castle front doors and to the left there is a small hut. He lives in there."

"Do I have to go alone?"

"Certainly not! But I would advise you not to bring many people if it is more of a personal problem."

"Thank you Dumbeldore sir."

"Of course my dear Lily. You may leave now." Lily stood up and walked obediently through the portrait. Professor Black was waiting for her.

"How much trouble are you in?" He sneered.

"None actually."

"What do you mean?"

"Dumbeldore knows that I didn't do it." And then, without even thinking, Lily walked away from the teacher, even while he was shouting to her;

"I don't believe you! I'm going to go talk to Dumbeldore!" But Lily didn't care. She knew very well what Dumbeldore had said, and she also knew that she was in no trouble, except for the fact that she still had a horrible, long detention heading her way. But at least, she thought, I will be with James and Sirius and Remus and Peter.

~

"Lily! Lily! What did Dumbeldore say?" The fivesome were heading for their next class, which was Defense against Dark Arts with Professor Quirrell.

"He said he knew I didn't do it."

"How did he know?" Lily smiled.

"Sometimes it's better not to ask questions." And leaving the puzzled boys behind she walked into the classroom. All of the boys shortly joined her. The lesson went quite smoothly. Yet whenever Lily looked at Professor Quirrell, she shuddered, as if knowing that some day in the future, something would happen, something horrible that had to do with her, and if not her, her child. She shuddered whenever he spoke. She shuddered whenever he looked at her or when he called on her. The boys all noticed.

"Lily, were you just really cold or what?" James asked, putting his arm around her.

"No. I'm fine."

"Then why were you shaking so much."

"Was it visible?"

"Oh yes! Your whole desk was shaking!"

"It was?"

"Yes."

"I don't know why, but I have a very bad feeling about that man. He's going to do something terrible to me, I just know it." Lily had learned to take her hunches seriously, for they were almost always right. The boys had learned to take her hunches seriously also, for the day before she had guessed exactly what they were having for dinner, and guessed the next morning who would get a letter during breakfast and was right.

"Ooh! Lunch time! Finally, I am STARVED!" That was Sirius.

"Oh, after lunch would you all come down to see Hagrid with me? He's going to solve our problem with Severus. Dumbeldore already gave us permission."

"You know I would like to, but I hear that transfiguration is very interesting."

"Hey I know, why don't you and James go, you lovebirds you!"

"Shut up Sirius!"

"Well James, if you want to come…"

"Lily, I would love to come." The other boys laughed, even Peter. James glared at them. They all stopped.

"So I'll meet you by the front doors after lunch?"

"Sure."

Hagrid

"Well Fang, I hear frim Dumbeldore that we're gonna have us some visitors right after lunch." Hagrid reached down and petted his enormous dog. "It's about Severus. I knew from the minute I saw him he was going to be trouble." Fang howled in agreement. Suddenly there was a knock at the door. "That should be them now." He strode over to the door, a huge smile on his face. After all, he wanted to make a good first impression. He threw the door open. There stood a boy and a girl. The girl had flowing red hair and wonderfully green eyes. The boy, was a smidge taller than she, with black hair that came over his eyes and stuck up in the back and sparkling bright blue eyes. He had his arm around the girl. They look like quite a couple! Hagrid thought to himself and chuckled a bit.

"Hello. My name's Lily and this is my friend James."

"Ah! How nice of you to come. Come in, come in." Hagrid ushered them inside. James pulled out a chair for Lily and Lily sat down. James, instead of going to sit at the other side of the table, he stood by her. He looked at Hagrid as if afraid he might hurt her. Hagrid tried to ignore him.

"So, I hear you've been havin' some trouble with Severus."

"Yes."

" Why exactly is he doin' this to ya? Or do you not know?"

"He said he doesn't like James or any of James's friends, because James glared at Slytheriens when they laughed at one of our friends."

"I would glare at them horrible Slytheriens too, if I wasn't workin' here." James seemed to relax a bit. He seemed to think that anyone that didn't like Slytheriens was a friend. "What did Severus do to ya?"

"Well during potions class he started making fun of Professor Black, and when Professor Black asked who was making fun of him, he blamed it on me."

"I see. Did he do anythin' to James yet?"

"No sir." Hagrid chuckled. He had never been called sir before.

"Hmm…. Well if it was me, I would get meself a orb of truth."

"Orb of truth? What's that?"

"Well if someone lies then it lights up. So if Severus blames you on something that you didn't do it would light up."

"But where can I get one?"

"Here, I think I have one you can have. I don't need it."

"Are you sure?"

"Yep."

"Thank you very much!" Hagrid handed her a glass orb.

"Here watch. My name is Billy." The orb warmed up and turned bright red. The whole room was cast with a red shadow.

"Wow!" It was the first thing that James said the whole time. Hagrid chuckled some more.

"Glad you like it. It should help. But there's also other stuff."

"Other stuff?"

"Yah, like puttin' spells on your shoes so ya can't get em off, puttin' snakes in your bed… Now that I don't know what to do about. But I suppose if ya wanna you could just tell me and I could give im detention." James laughed gleefully. Hagrid raised an eyebrow. "Like that idea, do ya? Well just know I'm trustin' you, so no saying he did something that he didn' do. Got that?"

"Yes sir!" Hagrid chuckled again.

"Lily, ya don' 'ave to call me sir. You can just call me Hagrid."

"Sorry Hagrid. Do you happen to have the time?" Hagrid looked at an old clock lying next to his bed.

"Woah! You two've almost missed the rest of the day's lessons. Ya know what? Why don't you just stay 'ere and 'ave tea with me? You won't be missin' that much, and I'm sure you 'ave a friend who can fill ya in on what ya did miss? An' if ya do get in trouble, the blame's on me." Lily and James liked this idea very much, so they did.

The challenge

"Nice trick Severus."

"Yah that was a good one."

"I wouldn't be surprised if that Lily person gets expelled!" The Slytheriens all laughed.

"She didn't come back all day. No one's seen her. Her and James. You know, I bet there in LOVE!" The nasty Slytherien made kissing faces and sounds. "Oh Lily! HAHAHA!" Love? Severus thought to himself. It was the next perfect thing to torture James about. Whenever he passed he could say things like, "Oh Lily!" and "Lily I love you!" And even better yet, "Lily, kiss me darling!" And if he and Lily were seen together… Severus's day was made.

At dinner, Severus made sure to take a seat that was positioned right behind James's. Perfect! He thought. Lily sitting right next to the baboon! GREAT! He made his voice high and squeaky, imitating a girl's. "Oh James! I love you so much!" It was loud enough for the Slytheriens around him and James and his friends to hear. Severus then put his voice low and serious. "Oh Lily, I love you too. Kiss me Lily, kiss me!" The Slytheriens started cracking up. Remus and Sirius, who were sitting across from Lily and James were looking very strangely at the two. They almost looked.... scared! James whipped around. Even Severus was a little startled. His face was bright red, not from embarrassment, but from anger, and he was almost shaking with rage.

"You make one more wise crack, just one more I'll...I'll..."

"You'll what?"

"I'll..."

All of a sudden Lily did something. She did something no one would ever imagine her doing. She whipped around, brought her hand up high and slapped Severus, as hard as she could right across the cheek. Severus whipped out his wit. So did Lily.

"I challenge you to a wizards duel Lily." Lily froze.

"Um..."

James all of a sudden remembered: Lily was still partly a muggle and she didn't know what a wizards duel was. He spoke up for her.

"I don't think Lily wants to." Lily looked relived.

"She's not married to you yet, James. She still gets to make her own choices." Severus snapped.

"Uh..." Lily looked to James with pleading eyes. They clearly said, What do I say? James very slowly nodded his head.

"Uh...sure."

"And none of those take over people incase you die." Lily tensed up. She looked as if about to cry. Her eyes, which were always readable, said, Die? I'm 11! I don't want to die! JAMES! What did you get me into? All at the same time. Lily nodded.

"Alright. Where?"

"Astronomy tower. 1:00. There aren't any astronomy lessons going on then."

"Alright." Lily and James didn't have much time to talk during dinner because anything and everything they said was going to be heard by Severus. They had to wait until after dinner, in Gryffindor common room.

The kiss

"James Potter, what did you get me into?"

"Looks like we better be going to bed. Night all!" Sirius, Remus and Peter snuck upstairs. Lily and James barley noticed.

"Ok Lily, it's really simple. All you do is go cast spells on each other. The first one to die or in this case give up loses."

"So I'm not going to die?"

"Heck no Lily! You think I would get you into something where you could die?"

"No not really, it's just that when Severus said die I kind of started to panic and..." Lily started to cry just thinking about. "James we missed most of our first day! I don't know how to do any spells!"

"Well then Severus probably doesn't know how to either. It's not like he pays attention in class." Lily continued sobbing. She plopped down into a chair. James sat down next to her, in the same chair, and put his arm around her. Usually, Lily felt uncomfortable, but this time he surprised her by lying her head on his shoulder.

"James I don't want to do this!"

"I hate to tell you this, but if you go back on your word all of the Slytheriens will make the next 7 years here a living nightmare. Trust me." They sat like that for a long time, James's arm around Lily and Lily's head on James's shoulder. They didn't know that the fire had died out long ago, and that Peter and Remus and Sirius had snuck back to the stairs to hear what was going on.

"Lily?" Remus finally spoke up.

"Yes?"

"I heard you don't know any spells. I can help you if you'd like." Lily looked at the clock. She had to be there at 1:00. It was 10:45. Earlier than Lily had thought.

"Thank you Remus. That would be very nice."

"And my brothers told me about some shortcuts around the castle incase you need to run." Sirius stood up from the darkness he had been hiding in.

"And I can show you how to make the shrinking potions we learned about in Black's class while you were at Dumbeldore's." Peter rose also, with some help from Sirius.

"Well, I wasn't suppose to tell or show anyone unless it was an absolute emergency, but I guess this a big emergency. My mum and dad bought me an invisibility cloak. When you put it on you go invisible. If you need to go there invisible or make a quick get away you can use it."

"Really James?"

"Sure! What are friends for?"

"Invisibility cloak! You never told me about an invisibility cloak!"

"Believe it or not Sirius, there are some things I don't tell you." Sirius gasped very dramatically. James grinned.

"You would all do all those things to help me?"

"Sure Lily, we don't want you to die."

"Sirius, she's not going to die."

"Whatever."

"Ok Lily, first I'll teach you the body bind spell."

"We didn't learn about that today."

"I read about it before Hogwarts."

"Oh."

"Ok first you..." The lessons went on and on. Lily tried to remember everything, but it was dreadfully hard.

"Ok Lily, if he walks to the left of you go down the stairs, take a right, another right, and then a left, and you should be in a hallway where you should see a portrait of an old lady. Walk up to the portrait and..."

"Wave your wand like so, with a little flick of the wrist, and say "Mangdidilan Laloso" and his feet will get stuck to..."

"Any kind of dust on the floor. That's all you need. That and a little bit of your hair. It was one of the first potions, where they had to use stuff all around them too..."

"Make sure it is tied tight. If it falls off or your head slips out you're in big trouble." Lily looked back at the clock. 12:30.

~

"Well Lily, you'd better be going."

"James, I don't want to go. Heck, I don't even know the astronomy tower is." James all of a sudden remembered he hadn't put that into consideration.

"I have an idea. Remus knows the building pretty well. How about he follows you in the invisibility cloak?" James thought about it and then added, "If Remus wants to."

"If you do Remus, I will take the offer."

"I'll do it. James why don't you go get the cloak." James walked up into the boy's dormitory and opened his trunk. He had told Lily there was nothing to be worried about, but Severus had proven himself to be tricky. James was very worried about Lily. He wished he could be going with her, but he didn't know where the astronomy tower was. He liked Sirius, and he knew Sirius knew how to get there, but when it came to girls, he trusted Remus a LOT more. And he knew Peter didn't know the way, that was pretty obvious. He grabbed the invisibility cloak and headed downstairs. He had a funny feeling in his stomach, the kind you get when you're excited. But he wasn't excited, so why did he feel funny? He realized that in the back of his mind, somewhere, he had gotten an idea. An idea he liked. Sure it wouldn't help Lily, but he liked it anyway.

~

"Here you go Lily." James handed her the cloak. He seemed to not want to let go of it, but did anyway.

"Be careful Lily."

"Thank you Sirius.

"Yah be careful you two." That was Peter. It was time for James to put his idea into action. He leaned over to Lily and kissed her. He knew how much he was going to made fun of, but he didn't care.

"That," he said, "is for good luck." And then Lily gave him another surprise. She kissed him.

"And that," she said, "is a thank you." Sirius looked like it was his birthday. Remus slipped on the invisibility cloak and they headed out, leaving the stunned James, Peter and Sirius behind.

The Wizard's Duel

"What was that about?"

"I don't know. He kissed me and then I automatically did that."

"Did you like the kiss?" Lily didn't answer for a while. She knew she could trust Remus. She would only answer that question if it came from him or possibly James.

"Well, yeah, I guess so."

"You guess so?"

"Well I don't know I never have kissed or been kissed so I don't know what it's supposed to feel like."

"Well judging by the way it looked like you guys were kissing, take a left here, it looked like that was better than what a kiss usually is."

"You've kissed someone before?" Remus blushed.

"Maybe." Lily snickered.

"We're here."

"Already?"

"The astronomy tower is actually very close to Gryffindor Common room."

"Cool!"

"Now before we go in, don't talk to me unless you absolutely HAVE to, because Severus will get suspicious. And if you do talk to me try to whisper."

"Ok." Lily opened the door and looked around. Along the wall across from the door there was about six or seven telescopes all pointing out the window. In the middle of the room there was a desk and chair and sitting in the chair, looking at the clock was Severus. He turned his head toward Lily when she entered.

"You're late. I thought you'd chicken out."

"Yah well there's a lot of things about me that you might think."

"I'm surprised. I thought you'd bring someone with you." Lily's face tried to go red but she forced it back.

"Well I guess you're wrong about two things, huh?" Severus whipped out his wand and got out of the chair and stood across from Lily. Lily could almost see Remus shaking in her mind; and she laughed a little bit at the thought. Severus scowled at her, thinking the laugh was directed to him. Lily brought out her wit. Severus got ready to count down from three. Lily tensed. Everything she had learned seemed to have floated out of her head. She was shaking so hard from concentrating that when Severus got to one her wand almost slipped out of her hit. Lily immediately said a spell where Severus's feet got stuck to the floor without even thinking about it. Severus cast a spell on her. She felt very light headed and dizzy and she started to fall. Remus's hand was suddenly on her shoulder, encouraging her to get back up. Lily did, even though the room looked like it was upside-down. She didn't want to say a spell, because she felt certain that the moment she would open her mouth she would throw up. So she didn't say a spell. She used a spell where she flicked her wrist three times, did a complicated sort of wiggle and Severus's hands snapped to his sides. She had body bound him AND his feet were stuck to the floor. He could still talk, but it was hopeless to move at all. Severus's eyes looked panic stricken, but when he realized what she had done his eyes turned to a glare. "Give up yet?" Lily asked. Severus pursed his lips. He looked angry with himself.

"FINE. YOU WON! NOW GO!" He shrieked. Lily knew better than to stand there. She left. She finally spoke out in the hallway.

"Are you there Remus?"

"Yah I'm here."

"Did I do alright?"

"Of course you did! Lily, you won a wizard's duel! That's a lot more than most people can ever say!" Lily grinned, pleased with herself with what she had done. "Take a right here Lily, and walk straight for awhile. We'll be back in no time."

~

"How did you do? I want to know everything!"

"Are you ok? Did Severus hurt you?"

"Did you give up your wand and just start punching him?" Peter punched an imaginary foe in front of him. Lily laughed. The moment she walked into the room she had been bombarded by the boys.

"Calm down, calm down! For all your information, I won the duel." The boys shouted gleefully and James hugged her. Lily hugged back. She looked at the clock. It was 2:00. "Do you all mind if I sit down? I'm still pretty dizzy."

"Of course! The champion needs to get the biggest seat!" Lily grinned and plopped down in a chair by the fire.

"Ok, so you want to here what happened?"

"Yah!" All of the voices chorused. James sat in the chair with her, Remus sat in front of the chair, Sirius took the chair next to Lily's and Peter lay down in front of the fireplace. Lily felt like a grandmother, telling a story to her grandchildren.

"Ok so I walk into the room and Severus is sitting there in the teacher's chair." And so Lily told the story. When she finished she realized it was already 2:30. She just then noticed how tired she was. "I'm going to bed." She said. "Good night everyone."

"Good night and congratulations Lily."

"Night."

"Good night."

"Sleep well." Lily stretched, leaned over, kissed James and went to bed. James stared at her until she was out of sight.

"Ooh! Just wait until everyone hears about this!" Sirius exclaimed. But James didn't hear him. He was still too dazed by Lily kissing him. Twice. And he had liked it and obviously she had too, otherwise she wouldn't have kissed back.

"Well, I don't know if I'm supposed to tell you guys this but Lily didn't say I couldn't so I guess I will. I asked Lily if she liked the kiss and she said yes."

"She did?" James felt very pleased with himself. His idea was turning out better than he had thought.

"Oh yeah James. She said, "OH I LOVE JAMES! HE KISSED ME SO WELL! OHH!!!"

"She did not Sirius. It was more like, "Yah well I guess. But I don't really know what a kiss is supposed to feel like. I've never kissed or been kissed."

"That doesn't seem possible. She's so beautiful."

"Hehe!"

"Shut up Sirius."

"You seem to be saying that more this year."

"I wonder why."

~

Flying lessons

The next day was the day that people had been looking forward to the most. Flying lessons began on that day.

"Who do we have it with?" Sirius asked, looking over James's shoulder at the piece of paper he was holding.

"Oh no! Slytheriens!" Remus exclaimed.

"I hope Severus doesn't blame Lily on anything again. Or any one of us for that matter."

"Oh I think we'll be fine." Lily winked at James. James winked back.

~

"Alright everybody, don't be shy and pick a broom. Come on now they're not going to bite you, you know!" It was flying lessons with the Slytheriens. It was being taught by Professor Callahan, a short plump woman who rather resembled a dwarf. "Now standby your broom and extend your left hit. Your left, Peter, your left! Right now, say, "Up!" Voices all chorused the magic word. Lily and James's jumped right into their hands and Remus's got half way there, but then decided it liked the ground better, Sirius's did nothing and Peter's turned over and shot through his legs, over his head and right back in front of him again. Lily looked around. Out of the 50 children being taught, only 5 children besides Lily and James had been successful in their approach. "Hmmm….right well if the broom isn't in your hand pick it up. Now everyone straddle your broom. When I say go you're going to kick off your feet and fly straight for about two feet, then push the broom handle down to land. Ready, one, two, three, go!" Lily kicked up.

She already knew she was going to love flying. She lowered the handle a little bit so she was going straight. She then lowered it even more and made a smooth landing. Lily looked around. Remus, Sirius and James had all done as well as she had. Peter was nowhere in sight. She looked up. Peter was very, very high above them. Professor Callahan was shouting instructions to him but he was so scared he wasn't listening. Lily decided to try.

"Peter, listen to me! Push your handle down and you will go down!" Peter didn't seem to like the idea, but he did anyway. Slowly he came back down to the ground. He collapsed into her arms.

"I was so scared thank you Lily! Thank you, thank you!" He was now hugging her. She looked at James, who looked a little uncomfortable and jealous at the same time. Lily rolled her eyes at him and then smiled. James blushed and grinned sheepishly. Peter got out of her arms. The rest of the lessons went just about the same, and out of the 10 other tries they had Peter only got stuck twice more.

~

Where's Remus?

That night, in the Gryffindor common room, Lily decided to write a letter to her parents. She wrote:

Dear Mom and Dad,

Hogwarts is great! You wouldn't believe about all the cool things here! I've already made four really great friends. James Potter, Sirius Black, Remus Lupin and Peter Pettigrew! But I have also met some not so nice people too. Severus Snape and Professor Black are both very mean. I've already learned so much! I had my first flying lesson today and I've had Potions and Defense Against the Dark Arts and so much more!

Things are really different here. Oh the kinds of city! There's pumpkin pasties and Bertie Botts Every Flavor Beans! But you have to be careful with those, because when they say every flavor, they mean EVERY flavor.

And the portraits move! One minute you could be looking at a portrait of a man, and he might scratch his nose or go to another picture!

And there's also Wizards Duels! It's when 2 wizards cast spells on each other until one-person dies or gives up.

Well it's pretty late so I've better be going. Talk to you later!

Love,

Lily

Lily looked down at her calendar that her parents had bought her. She loved her calendar. It told if someone special was born on that day or if there was some special holiday that other countries or her country celebrated. And it also showed the phase of the moon that was happening that night. That night it was a full moon. All of a sudden James, Sirius and Peter walked into the room. They had strange looks on their faces.

"Where's Remus?"

"I don't know. He asked what day it was and when we told him he asked what time it was. When we told him he all of a sudden looked really worried and said he had something to do and hurried off."

"That's weird."

"Yah I don't get why he did it."

"Uh...Lily?" James's voice cracked while saying it.

"Yes?"

"Can I..." he gulped, "can I talk to you?" He looked around the room at Sirius and Peter, and then added, "Privately?" Sirius snickered and walked off. Peter followed. "Um...about yesterday, when I uh kissed you, I don't know exactly what you thought and I'm sorry." Lily laughed.

"James, you don't need to apologize. I kind of.... liked it."

"YOU DID??? I mean...you did?"

"Well yeah. I didn't think I would ever like a kiss from a boy but I liked it."

"Um...can I uh maybe uh kiss you again?"

"Of course." Lily leaned forward, but then added, "And James?"

"Yes?"

"You don't have to ask next time." Lily finished leaning forward and kissed James. Out of the corner of her eye she saw something move. She broke off the kiss and looked out the window. Remus and Professor McGongall were standing by a tree she had learned was called The Whomping Willow. Professor McGongall kept looking nervously up at the sky.

"What's wrong?" James asked.

"I see Remus."

"Let's go down and see him."

"Ok." Lily and James headed downstairs, joined by Sirius and Peter once they saw they were heading out.

"Where are we going?"

"We saw Remus."

"Oh." They all turned a corner and walked through a long hallway until finally they got to the front doors. James opened it for all of them and they hurried around to the side of the building where the Whomping willow was. Remus and Professor McGongall were no where to be seen.

"That's weird. I know I saw them down here." All of a sudden, from off in the distance they heard a wolf-like howl, but something seemed a bit different about it. Lily shivered. "What was that?"

"I don't know. It kind of sounded like a werewolf."

"Sirius I don't think there are any werewolves around here."

"In the Forbidden Forest there might be."

"It was probably just a wolf. Anyway just to be safe maybe we should go back in."

"Fine by me. That howls giving me the creeps." James put her arm around her.

"That's ok. I think we're safe if we're all here. Plus Hagrid's cabin isn't to far away." They headed back for the castle, but didn't get very far.

"What are you doing out here?" They had run straight into Professor McGongall.

"Well ma'am we saw our friend Remus out here and we were wondering where he was so we came out to see him it…"

"Remus? You have no right to follow him or anyone else for that matter. Some people have private things that they must do and they don't need you interfering with it. Now go back to your dormitory at once. And five points from Gryffindor." Sirius waited until they were way out of earshot from Professor McGongall to start complaining.

"Five points??? Five points for following a friend???"

"Well Sirius you must admit that it wasn't really right to follow him."

"Fine but five points? That's unfair! That's really unfair!"

~

Detention

It was a wonderfully lovely Friday afternoon. Everyone had the rest of the day off. The fivesome were already making plans before lunch on lying on the front lawn and talking or exploring the castle for the rest of the day.

They finally got to talk during lunch.

"Where did you go last night Remus?"

"Yeah Remus where did you go?"

"Uh nowhere." Remus seemed to be hiding something. He was going very pale.

Then Lily remembered something horrible.

"We can forget about all that stuff we were going to do."

"Why? We have the rest of the day off!"

"No we don't. We have detention, remember?"

"Shoot I totally forgot."

"We have to go to Professor Black's room right after lunch to see what we have to do." Lunch seemed to go all to quickly and before they knew it they were at Professor Black's office. Lily reached up and knocked on the door. Professor Black opened it and sneered down at them.

"What do you want?"

"Well sir we have detention and we need to know what we're doing."

"Fine come in, come in." He finished unlocking his door and opened it for them. They all stepped in rather reluctantly. "Alright. I want to do this quickly because unlike certain troublemakers I have the rest of the day off. Now you two," he pointed to James and Remus, "I want you to clean my office. And I will be in here so if you say one word, just one word you're going straight to Dumbeldore's office. You," he pointed to Peter, "clean the hallway outside of my classroom, and you two," he finally pointed to Lily and Sirius, "You uh…just oh I don't know, go help Hagrid." James felt a little uncomfortable with Sirius and Lily paired up, but when he thought about how much help Hagrid would probably need he forgot about it. "Get to work! NOW!" Peter scrambled out of the room and Remus and James followed Professor Black to the storage room in the back to get cleaning materials. Sirius and Lily started heading out the door but before they could Professor Black stopped them. "I don't trust either one of you." He sneered. "I'm bringing Sir Nicholas De Mimsy Porpington to take you there." Lily was very confused. Sir Nicholas De what? She thought to herself. She looked to James and saw him mouth the word, Ghost. Ghost? I didn't know there were ghosts here? Lily thought. Professor Black pulled out a small pouch from a pocket in his robe. He opened the pouch and sprinkled some of its contents onto the ground and muttered, "Sir Nicholas De Mimsy Porpington come here." The powder turned into a column of smoke and out of the smoke came the form of a ghost. Lily gasped. "Show off." Professor Black muttered. "Was that really necessary?" He said, loud enough for the ghost to hear.

"Oh but of course good Professor! I must make a good first impression!" He beamed a smile at Sirius and Lily, since they were the closest ones to him.

"You need not make a good impression on these pupils. They are troublemakers. I called you here to assist two of them to Hagrid's hut." The ghost's smile faded.

"Oh trouble makers. Well that's different then." He turned towards Sirius and Lily, who were supposedly the troublemakers. James, Remus and Peter had all stopped to watch. "You know I was a bit of a troublemaker myself." He pushed his head to one side and Lily saw it was connected by barely a thread. She screamed. James made an effort to get up to comfort her, but Remus kept him down. "And look what happened to me!" Professor Black sighed. His head was in his hands. It was clear that he did not care for him much. "Yes that's why they call me nearly headless nick."

"Stop with all the fancy stuff and take these two to Hagrid's hut."

"Alright. Follow me." Out in the hallway he finally talked to them. "So what do you have detention for?"

"We were late for class."

"Is that all? Bah! That doesn't deserve detention. What year are you in and what day was it.

"First year first day."

"First lesson." Sirius added

"Well then you certainly shouldn't have detention. You have to watch out with Black though he's a strict one he is. Doesn't like much of anyone except the Slytheriens. And occasionally Huffelpuffs. Do you know where Hagrid's hut is?"

"Yes it's just that Professor Black said that he didn't trust us."

"Hmm…wonder why? Anyway here we are!"

"Already?" Lily hadn't even noticed that she had walked out the front door. The ghost chuckled.

"Yes already! Well I hope the rest of the day treats you better. Farewell and try to keep out of trouble!" He waved to them and they waved back. Lily watched in astonishment as Nearly Headless Nick floated right through the castle wall. They walked the last few feet to Hagrid's hut and Lily knocked on the door. Hagrid opened it.

"Well hello there Lily! Who's your friend?"

"My name's Sirius. Sirius Black." Hagrid extended a hand. Sirius took it doubtfully.

"Well how do you do?"

"Fine. And you?"

"Just great. I'm doing just fine!"

"Well Hagrid as much as I hate to say it we're here for detention." Hagrid raised an eyebrow.

"What did you do?"

"We're were late for our first class with Professor Black."

"Ah. You wouldn't believe how many students have had detention because of that." He chuckled a bit. "I'm assuming he sent you here to help me?"

"Yes."

"Alright well hmm…. I don't need much help. Well actually Sirius I have some spellbooks and potion ingredients down 'ere that you could bring up to the castle and Lily you can 'elp me find Kathy Blue's cat. She ran into the forest about a day ago." Hagrid walked out the door and around the back of the hut. When he returned he had three huge boxes. He set them down on the floor. "These are the books and ingredients. They're smaller boxes inside of 'em that you can carry in." Sirius scowled at the box while Hagrid opened it and handed him two smaller boxes. Sirius's knees sagged. The boxes looked very heavy. "Come on Lily we got ourselves a cat to find!" They headed out the door and toward the forest. "Now Lily, we should be pretty safe in the forest since it's day time outside, but just to be safe stick with me at all times. Don't go wondering off nowhere. Got that?"

"Ok Hagrid."

"Good. I wouldn't want there to be any accidents." Lily shivered. She had never been this close to the forest before and now that she was she noticed that there was a small path leading from the back door of Hagrid's hut to the forest. They took the path for about five minutes, and every now and then they would call and say things like, "Here kitty, kitty." Or, "Come here kitty!" They kept walking on. The forest seemed to get darker and colder with every step. All of a sudden, some of the bushes next to the path rustled. Lily stopped dead in her tracks.

"Hagrid?" she called. Hagrid stopped, turned around and came back to where she was.

"Yeah?"

"Something moved in that bush." Hagrid moved Lily aside gently, yet firmly. She looked at the bush again. Two yellow eyes were staring out at her. Hagrid saw them too. He pushed aside the branches of the bush and found not a monster, but a cat. He reached his hits in and pulled out the cat. He handed her to Lily.

"'Ere. You can carry 'er." Lily stroked the cat. It didn't purr or move, just kept staring behind Lily. She had a very BAD feeling that something bad was behind her. She whirled around just in time to see a swish of a furry, golden tail that looked EXACTLY like that of a lion's. Nothing else was there. Hagrid saw her staring at the empty space.

"Hagrid, what kind of animals are in here?"

"Centaurs, Werewolves, Unicorns, Trolls..."

"What about lions?"

"Lions? Nawh, ain't got none of them. But once I did see a Griffin. I was only a youngun then though, so I ran."

"A Griffin? What's that?"

"It's an animal with the head of an eagle and the wings of an eagle but the body of a lion. Griffins are very rare, extinct, almost. Some people say they work for you-know-who."

"Who?"

"Oh, I hate to say 'is name. So only make me say it once. Voldemort. One BAD wizard. Used to go to 'Ogwarts, 'e did. Slytherien, of course. Dumbeldore's the only one he's afraid of. Ain't too strong yet, but I get feelings 'bout these things. He's gonna become very strong in no time. Sure, 'e already does 'orrible things, but soon the things he does are gonna be even worse. I just KNOW it." So I'm not the only one who gets hunches. Lily thought, laughing to herself inside her head. "Well we best be heading back. We got the cat, and Sirius should be done by now." So they headed back to the hut. By the time they got there Sirius only had three more small boxes to carry into the castle. Lily offered to help and they were invited to have tea with Hagrid after they were done. They decided they liked this idea. Sirius carried two of the boxes since he was stronger, and Lily carried one. After putting the boxes in their place they headed toward Professor Black's room. The hallway outside his room was spotless. Sirius crouched down and wiped his finger across the floor. It squeaked. They both laughed, although not to silently, and then peeked into the room. Luckily, Professor Black was nowhere to be seen. Instead, Nearly Headless Nick was floating around the room watching progress. It looked like Peter had gone in to help James and Remus. They look on James face clearly said that he had heard the laugh and was jealous. Lily like James a lot, a WHOLE lot, but she wished he wouldn't get so jealous. Sirius opened the door and held it open for Lily, which surprised her a bit, because Sirius NEVER did that, even for James.

"You guys are done already?"

"Well yeah."

"Lucky."

"Are you guys almost done? Hagrid invited us to have tea with him."

"Well we should have been done a long time ago, but Professor Black left a bit before Nearly Headless Nick got here, and while we were by ourselves Peeves came in and messed the room up again. But we're still almost done."

"Almost done?" Nearly Headless Nick, who until up to this point had been listening, chimed in. "It looks to me like you are done! You can go and have tea with Hagrid."

"Really? Oh thank you!"

"Of course! And if you get in any sort of trouble the blames on me." Lily felt like hugging Nearly Headless Nick, but she was still a bit weary about touching him, let alone hugging him. James, Remus and Peter picked up their buckets of water and sponges and soap and brought them to the back room where all of the cleaning supplies were kept. When they returned Sirius opened the door for Lily and then when James tried to walk through he closed the door. Everyone laughed, even James, and Lily opened the door for him.

They had a wonderful time with Hagrid, telling him all about what had happened so far in the year. They didn't talk about the Wizard's duel, since it was against school rules, but Sirius at one point did bring up the fact that Lily and James had kissed. Lily didn't know why, but Hagrid didn't seem too surprised with the news.

~

Voldemort and the Quidditch match

"Yes! We get to go watch the Quidditch match today!" Sirius exclaimed, looking at a sheet on a bulletin board.

"Quidditch?"

"Oh yeah it's this great Wizard's sport!" And was exactly one weak since the day they had had detention. Lily had not yet told them about the tail she had seen in the woods. But she was planning on telling them that night. The rest of the day whenever Lily tried to ask the boys a question they're answer always seemed be, "Quidditch!" By lunchtime Lily had given up all hope of talking to them. During lunch, Dumbeldore made an announcement.

"As most of you have already heard, the first Quidditch match will be held today." The whole school it seemed erupted into cheering. Dumbeldore silenced them with a raise of his hit. "For all of 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th years who already know where the stadium is, please WALK there right after lunch. 1st years follow the head of your house there. And remember your way, there's many more Quidditch matches to come and you won't always be able to follow the head of your house there." he laughed a bit. "You may continue with your meal." Once again the whole school started laughing and chatting. James looked around, and then poked Lily.

"What did you do that for?"

"Look at the Slytheriens." Lily looked at them. They were all huddled together, obviously scheming a plan. "What do you want to bet it has to do with us?" Lily felt around in her pocket for the orb of truth, and held it tight. Sure enough, when they broke apart, Severus yelled, possibly as loud as he could,

"I hate Quidditch! I hate Dumbeldore! The only person I like is my trouble-making girlfriend Lily! Everyone here is better left dead than alive!" Lily and James were the first to freeze. Then everyone else followed. The whole room was silent. Dumbeldore was the first to speak.

"I demand to know who said that!" All of the Slytheriens that had been huddled together pointed towards James. Their voices chorused together in saying, he did. "Is that true, Mr. Potter?" Lily all of a sudden brought out the orb. It was still glowing bright red from the last lie told.

"Excuse me sir," Lily interrupted, "But I think that the Slytheriens are lying." She held up the orb. Dumbeldore walked down from his spot at the teacher's table and examined the orb, more than likely making sure it was a REAL orb.

"Well done my dear Lily. You just saved an innocent boy from possibly expelled from Hogwarts. But I'm not sure who said it."

"Well here let me try. Severus was the one who said all the stuff to get James in trouble." The orb did nothing.

"Well done again Lily! Severus, instead of going to the Quidditch match I would like you to come to my office after lunch." Severus scowled, then turned toward Lily and gave her the dirtiest look possibly anyone had ever seen. Unfortunately James saw and returned the look and a rather rude gesture.

~

"And this is the stadium!" The head of the Gryffindor house had just led all of the first years to the stadium. This was the only other place that Lily could see the whole school huddled into one place, besides the Great Hall. James, Sirius, Peter, Remus and Lily walked together to a row of empty seats close to the front.

"Who's playing today?"

"Huffelpuff and Gryffindor."

"Yah! Gryffindor rocks! GO GRYFFINDOR!" All of a sudden, two teams marched out onto the field with broomsticks in their hits. Everyone started cheering and yelling, "Go Gryffindor!" or, "Go Huffelpuff!" It was VERY loud. If a bomb dropped it was more than likely no one would hear it. A girl's voice suddenly came on over the intercom.

"Hello everybody I'm Mary Blue and welcome to the first Quidditch match of the year. Gryffindor and Huffelpuff, for any of you who don't know. So first of all, let's hear it for Huffelpuff!" The Slytheriens and Huffelpuffs started cheering. The girl interrupted them. "And now, let's growl for Gryffindor!" If the Huffelpuffs and Slytheriens were loud, they were NOTHING compared to the cheering of Ravenclaw and Gryffindor. Everyone seemed to be screaming at the top of their lungs. A few were even cat calling the other team. In the mean while the players had risen on their brooms and were flying around gleefully. Suddenly, seven balls flew out onto the field. "Alright, here we go! The Quaffle is taken right away by Heather Gray of Huffelpuff! But a bludger hit by Mark Cary knocks it right out of Heather's hands! But, what's this? Tiffany Blear was underneath Heather and has caught the ball! She's heading towards the hoops, but oh! Gryffindor's keeper, Kevin White blocks it!" Suddenly, there was a scream. Not the kind of, go team! Scream, but the kind of scream when you're about to die. It was the people around her that were quiet first and then soon everyone in the stadium was. The girl was pointing up in the air, speechless. Lily looked to see what she was pointing at. In the sky was a lion. No, an eagle. Lily couldn't tell what it was. Someone else did though.

"Griffin! RUN!" Everyone started screaming. People were climbing on their seats trying to get away. Lily grabbed on to James, who was the person nearest to her, because she was terrified. A sudden swarm of students came right at them, forcing them to let go of each other. When the swarm cleared, James, Sirius, Remus and Peter were nowhere to be seen. Lily looked around. She was all alone in the stadium with a griffin. She started running also. Lily ran through the door. She saw a group of students running and tried to follow them, but something grabbed her. She looked up. All she saw was a wand being fluttered around. And then there was darkness.

~

"Lily? Lily? Where are you? Lily?" Back in the Gryffindor common room Sirius, James, Peter and Remus were all searching desperately for her. They even had a girl that they didn't know check in the girl's dormitory and restroom for her. She was nowhere to be found.

"What are we going to do? Lily's gone!"

"I don't know about you but I'm going out to look for her."

"James that's stupid! There's a griffin out there! You'll get killed!"

"Yeah well then so will she! I need to help her."

"James," Sirius put his hand on James's shoulder, "I'm coming with you."

"Thank you Sirius."

"Well if Sirius is going than I guess I will too."

"Thanks Remus." They all looked at Peter expectantly.

"I'm not going anywhere! I want to live!"

"Fine Peter." They all started heading towards the portrait, everyone except for Peter. Unfortunately, the head of the house was standing in front of it. "Excuse me." James muttered and squeezed his way past the boy.

"Where do you think you're going?"

"I think I'm going to go safe my friend's life."

"Girlfriend."

"Shut up Sirius."

"Sorry but I can't let you go."

"Wanna bet?" Remus whipped out his wand and body bound the boy. They continued on. The hallways were empty. Not even the teachers were walking through them. They walked together, CLOSE together, for a good ten minutes, and saw no trace of Lily. Or anyone else, for that matter. Sirius did however see a man turning a corner. They followed after him. The man stopped at a closet, and threw something inside. Something with red hair. He looked around, but luckily not behind him, and, seeing nothing, continued on his way. James was the first one to the closet. He did though wait for the others before opening the door. Sure enough, there was Lily, either unconscious or dead. James prayed to God that she wasn't dead. After they were all inside they heard a horrible laugh. They whirled around. Standing in the door was Voldemort. He closed the door, and magically locked it. It was pitch black. Everyone was very glad for the spell that lighted your wand that Remus knew. They all muttered, "Lumos", and the room was bright enough so that they could see. Lily was sprawled out across the floor. Her lip was bleeding, probably from being tossed into the room so harshly. Her arms were scraped badly. Not bleeding, but scraped. That made the arms of her robe torn and ripped badly. James thought he saw something red beneath her bangs and brushed them aside. Sure enough there was a deep gash on her forehead too. James kneeled down beside her. Sirius and Remus stepped back. He shook her shoulders gently. To his great delight, Lily's eyelids fluttered. She opened her eyes. And started crying. She threw herself at James and held him tight. He held her tight also.

"Lily, what happened?"

"Well I was holding onto you and all of a sudden those kids came and when they went you were gone and I was the last one in the stadium and then I went into Hogwarts and I saw some kids running and I followed them but something grabbed me and I all I saw was a wand fluttering and someone speaking with such a horrible voice and then…. And then somehow I got here." Lily started shaking. "Oh James it's all my fault! I saw the griffin's tale in the woods and I didn't tell anyone! I was going to tell you tonight and if I had then none of this would have happened and…" She started crying again. James was so happy that she was alive that he almost started crying too. ALMOST. But he knew no one needed 2 people crying, so he just held Lily tight.

"Uh guys, sorry to interrupt you but we have more important things to worry about. The door is locked and pretty soon we'll be running out of air." Lily got an idea. She fumbled around in her pocket and brought out a bobby pin.

"Lily, this is no time to do your hair!"

"Sirius use some sense! I'm going to try to pick the lock!"

"Oh. Well that's ok." She stuck one end of the bobby pin in and fumbled around a bit. It seemed like no one else in the room was even breathing. The bobby pin hit a piece of metal. She pushed in and tried the handle. The door swung open. Sirius, Remus and James all started cheering, but Lily silenced them.

"Be quiet! We don't want one of them to find us again."

"Sorry."

"I'm not mad I just don't want to be found. Now come on. Let's go this way." They headed down the corridor on tiptoe, looking ever which way. They rounded the corner and knocked straight into a man.

~

"Stupid Lily. Stupid James. Stupid everyone."

"Severus, are you ok?"

"SHUT UP!" The boy backed away. Severus was sitting, scowling in a chair by the fire in the Slytherien common room.

"Well you know what? I was using my spy a scope to spy in the Gryffindor common room and Lily never got there." Severus didn't stop scowling, but he was now interested.

"Tell me more."

"Well since Lily wasn't there Sirius, Remus and James went out to look for her. And they haven't come back yet."

"Good. I hope they're all dead."

"Don't we all?" The whole common room erupted into laughing.

~

James didn't want to look up to see who he had bumped into, because he was sure that he already knew who it was. He looked up and saw that he was right. They had run straight into Voldemort. He took a step back. Lily was standing next to him, mortified. He grabbed her and pulled her behind him. Sirius was on the other side of him and Remus was next to Lily. A book was on the ground, obviously one that Voldemort had dropped. Voldemort made a fireball, no an ice ball, James couldn't tell what it was but he made it and threw it right at him. First he felt heat, and then he felt cold, and then he felt heat again. It knocked him backward, him and Sirius, since they were the ones in front. His head hit the wall. The last thing he saw before his eyes closed were Lily and Remus standing in front of Voldemort.

~

Lily whirled around and saw that both James and Sirius were unconscious. Remus was standing next to her, but she had never seen him look so scared. He was shaking and his skin was so pale it looked like he had jumped into a bag of flour. Lily didn't think he was going to last long before fainting. She prayed he wouldn't though. She didn't know who this person was but she could tell he was evil. Lily didn't know why she did it, she would never know why, but she grabbed the book. Remus stared at her and then fainted, just as she knew he would.

Lily didn't know what to do. She could tell that this person wanted the book. Should she give it to him? Should she run to the common room? Or should she run to the teachers lounge? Lily made up her mind quickly. She started running to the teacher's lounge. He laughed, the kind of laugh you laugh when you're thinking, You're so ignorant! You can't get away from me!

He was following her. Lily didn't have to see behind her to know he was following her. She was so glad she knew where the teacher's lounge was. She didn't think when she took a turn, she just knew were to go. She kept running. Straight ahead of her was the lounge. She could see shadows of the teachers in the room. Suddenly, her feet wouldn't move anymore. They were stuck to the ground. She then realized that the floor was starting to cover her. She was being buried in the floor!

Lily was so close to the door. So close but she couldn't quite reach the handle! Voldemort was getting nearer and nearer. The floor was up to her hips. There was only one thing she could think of to do. She screamed. If she screamed loud enough the teachers would hear and come out. They heard.

Dumbeldore was the first to come through the door. Then McGongall, then Black and then Quirrell. Many others followed but Lily didn't know who they were. Hagrid was the last one to come out the door. After one look at the situation the teachers started casting. McGongall cast a counter curse on her, and the floor went back down. The rest of the teachers were focused on Voldemort. Professor Black hit him with a fireball and then Dumbeldore said a few words and he was nowhere to be seen. Dumbeldore rushed over to her.

"Lily dear are you alright? You just faced Voldemort by yourself!"

"That was Voldemort?"

"Yes it is. Now Lily are you alright?"

"Sir I'm fine but James and Sirius and Remus are all unconscious."

"Mrs. White!" The school nurse stepped forward. "I need you to come with me please. There are three unconscious students somewhere in the school. Lily please show us where they are." Lily led them there. Mrs. White made three stretchers and placed the boys on them. The stretchers magically floated away. No matter how much Lily insisted Mrs. White made her go the infirmary also. Dumbeldore walked with them. When they got there Lily tried to hand him the book, but for some reason it wouldn't go into his hands.

"Professor Dumbeldore, Voldemort was trying to take this. For some reason I grabbed it and well… you can't seem to take it."

Dumbeldore took one look at the book and then started thanking Lily.

"Lily, if you had not grabbed this book Voldemort would have become invincible. Forever. It is called the book of darkness, and it truly is. He would have been able to kill anyone and no one would have even been able to touch him. Although I'm sure that soon he will become almost invincible he will not be all the way there. At least for a while. But we must be careful. He will come back for the book. He will keep coming back until he gets it." Lily nodded and swallowed. Suddenly Mrs. White grabbed her harshly by the arm and dragged her into one of the beds. Dumbeldore smiled and waved goodbye. James was in the bed next to her, Sirius in the one across from her and Remus the one across from James. Lily felt drained. She had a feeling that part of the spell that Voldemort cast on her was to drain the person of magic for a while so that they couldn't cast anything on you. Mrs. White turned out the lights and left the room. Lily wished more than anything James or Sirius or Remus were awake. She wanted to tell them what Dumbeldore had said.

However, not one of them woke up until the next day, and then not until about 3:00 in the afternoon. Remus was the first to wake up. She immediately started telling the story from when Sirius and James got knocked back, because Remus said he only remembered up to that point. James was the next to wake up, but it was about two hours after Remus. They both started telling the story at the same time, which made James laugh and then double over in pain. It hurt to laugh for all of them. Sirius was the last to wake up, about four hours after James. The ball had come directly at Sirius, and James only got a little bit of its side effects. Dumbeldore came to visit them at around 9:30 along with Peter. He said that Sirius and James were lucky to be alive with the spell that they had had cast on them.

Mrs. White wouldn't let them go until two days after Dumbeldore's visit. They learned that by the time they got back to classes, the whole school knew what happened. At least most of them did. Some of them had other ideas then what happened, like the Griffin knocked Lily out and James grabbed the book, or that Lily became a complete statue and wasn't discovered until two hours later, and that Sirius and Remus knocked out Voldemort.

These were only a few stories that Lily, James, Remus and Sirius heard. Every time they passed someone is seemed they heard a new rumor. And of course since this was found out, so was Lily and James kissing. The Slytheriens had a lot to do with this. It was pretty hard not to ignore them making kissing sounds and saying "oh James!" and then "oh Lily!" whenever someone passed, ESPECIALLY James or Lily. Of course, Sirius tried to help out with the news that they had actually kissed, but they made sure that not too many people found out. Lily was shocked when a few Gryffindors made kissing noises when she passed. She nearly slapped Severus a good few times. And a number of other Slytheriens too, for that matter. The thing that got to her a bit was that Peter never even said sorry for not coming along.

Most of the school had grown to admire them. After all, it was them who had stopped Voldemort from becoming invincible. Actually, it was more Lily, but whenever anyone tried to give Lily all the credit, she wouldn't allow it and start rambling on about how they all saved her by rescuing her from the closet, and how Sirius and James had tried to protect her from Voldemort. Usually, by the time she was done, she no longer had an audience,

The only people who did NOT admire them at ALL were who else than the Slytheriens. Instead of looking at all the good things they did, they looked at the bad. They talked about Remus fainting; and Lily being tossed into a closet, and James and Sirius being blown back by a "measly" fire ice ball. They were careful, however, not to say anything while James was around.

MOST of the first years were huddling together in the halls, afraid that either the Griffin or Voldemort might be lurking around a corner. Lily had to admit she seemed to be holding on more to James and holding him more tightly. A few times he even had to ask her to stop squeezing his arms so hard. Of course Lily was very embarrassed at these times and Sirius would laugh and Remus and Peter would snicker and then Lily would go horribly red. Usually James would shoot them a look and then either put his arm around Lily or once he kissed her.

September faded into October and soon people were talking excitedly about what they were doing over break. A good deal of them, including Lily and Remus and Peter, were going home.

They planned to all ride together and of course James and Sirius were coming to see them off. Lily wanted to stay, but she missed her parents so much she didn't think she could bare it. James and Sirius had pleaded for them all to stay but they always said no. Finally they gave in, whether from seeing it wasn't working or realizing they missed their families so much they NEEDED to go home, no one could tell. Including James and Sirius.

Before long, the break was there and much to James and Sirius's disappointment, the train did come. They had been talking the whole day about the train falling off the track and such hoping to jinx it. As Lily boarded the train, James looked like he was about to cry. She smiled at him, pulled him close and kissed him. She hugged Sirius and they all waved goodbye.

A shocking surprise

The school didn't seem…right without all of the students there. Everyone, even the Slytheriens, noticed that James and Sirius seemed gloomier than usual. The Slytheriens would make jokes about it, the Ravenclaws would make some highly intelligent remark, the Gryffindors would try to cheer them up and the Huffelpuffs well, didn't do much of anything. The one good thing was that Severus had gone home for the holidays also.

~

"Here you are. 2 pumpkin pasties and a bag of Bertie Botts every flavor beans." The witch handed Lily her candy.

"Sure you don't want any Remus?"

"Yah, I'm fine." Peter had fallen asleep, (as he seemed to do often on trains) behind them. Remus hadn't ordered anything. "Isn't today the 2nd?"

"Yes, why?"

"Just curious."

"Aren't you sad to leave the castle for a whole month?" Remus looked relieved that Lily had changed the subject.

"Yeah. I miss James and Sirius already."

"Me too." They sat for hours, saying nothing, just thinking about Hogwarts. Then they started talking again.

"Isn't it amazing?"

"What's amazing?"

"That fact that even though you-know-who cast a spell on you, twice, you lived. And James and Sirius lived. And I didn't do much of anything. Except faint."

"Sure you did Remus."

"What?"

"Well I can't think of anything right now but…" Remus punched her playfully in the shoulder.

"Thanks."

"Anytime." They both smiled. The train slowed down.

"Are we here already?"

"Guess so." Sure enough when Lily looked out the window, even though it was dark outside, she could see that they had stopped at platform 9 and¾. She could tell because as close to the train as you could get were her parents. It wasn't long before they had to wake Peter up and pull off the luggage. Lily introduced Remus and Peter. Remus started looking around for his parents. Peter found his Grandparents right away and left as soon as he saw them. Remus kept looking around and Lily's mother refused to leave until Remus found his parents. Suddenly, two men with the blackest of black robes appeared in front of them.

"Kit! Dan! What are you doing here?"

"Hello Remus. I'm afraid we're here with bad news." Remus went white. "Remus," the man sighed. "I don't know how to tell you this, but well, you-know-who came to the witches and wizards town meeting last night and went on a rampage. So many were killed, including…including your parents." Remus went even whiter than when they had been standing face to face with Voldemort. He plopped down on the ground, dazed, seeing no reason for standing. Lily kneeled down and hugged him. He started to cry. She held him tight, just as James had held her on countless occasions. He held her tight also.

"Remus come and stay with us." Lily told him. Remus looked up at her horrified.

"Lily, I…I can't I just…can't you…you wouldn't understand it…even if I told you…know one understands….no one except my parents but…but…that doesn't matter because they're…they're dead now."

"Why can't you stay with us?" With some difficulty and using Lily for support, Remus got off the ground and led her to behind a pole where no one else was.

"Lily, I didn't want to tell…tell anyone, but…but now I have to. I know you won't…won't want to be my friend anymore, but just…just please don't tell James and…and Sirius and Peter." Lily nodded her head, confused.

"Lily I'm…" he seemed lost for words. "I'm…I'm… a…a… Lily I'm a…a werewolf." Lily stared at him. "That's why you saw me…me going into the whomping willow. I…I transform there. Tomorrow's the full moon…I…I just can't stay with you it…it would be too dangerous…."

"Remus, I don't care that you're a werewolf." She smiled and then added, "as long as you don't bite me." He smiled back at her.

"Really?"

"Really. You're a great friend."

"Kit and Dan will want me to live with them. They…they know how to handle my…transformations. They have a big…big woods behind their house where I can go."

"Remus I said I still want to be your friend. You can stop stuttering now."

"Oh…oh uh sorry." Lily laughed at him. "But you won't tell James and Sirius and Peter right? I don't want everyone to know. And DEFINETLEY don't tell Severus."

"Yuck! Why would I tell Severus?"

"I don't know just want to make sure." Lily laughed again. Remus hugged her. "I'm sorry I can't live with you for a while."

"That's ok. Who are Kit and Dan anyway?"

"They are," he stiffened, "…were…my parents best friends."

"Oh." Lily wished she wouldn't have said anything. Remus looked close to tears again. They walked out from behind the pole and Remus rushed over to Kit and Dan.

"We'll take you home Remus. You can live with us until Hogwarts is done."

"Thank you Dan. Thank you Kit." And with a final wave Remus left.

~

Gone!

"I have to admit, I miss everyone."

"Yah I do too Sirius. It's not the same without everyone here."

"I know. It's quieter than it usually is. Lily and Remus and Peter aren't here to cheer us up. But at least Severus isn't here to make jokes about us to the whole school."

"Yah I think all the Gryffindor's are starting to really hate him."

"Starting? James, it's a well known fact that Slytherien and Gryffindor have always been enemies, ever since Salzar Slytherien, Godric Gryffindor, Heldga Huffelpuff and Rowena Ravenclaw founded our school! Salzar and Godric were always fighting!"

"How did you learn so much?"

"People think I goof off a lot, but I don't." James, because he was looking at Sirius and not where he was going bumped straight into someone. He hated bumping into people. It was always someone he didn't want to bump into. James looked up. He was relieved to see not Voldemort, or Severus, or Professor Black, but Dumbeldore. But Dumbeldore looked worried.

"James! Sirius! I'm so glad I found you!" Sirius and James stared at him confused. "I'm afraid Lily is in terrible danger! Where is she?"

"She and Remus and Peter went home for the holidays sir. Why…?"

"I was afraid of that. I don't have much time but come here and I will explain." He led them into the nearest empty classroom. "Last night Voldemort re-entered the school and was most likely trying to find the book, but Lily still has it. He was last seen at a wizarding town near where Lily lives. He killed many people including Remus's parents." Sirius and James stared at him again, this time wide eyed.

"But what does all this have to do with Lily?"

"When you do a search spell you need unicorn hair and sulfur ash. The unicorn hair is never completely used. You also need something that belongs to the person you are trying to find. In this classroom I found some unicorn hair and some other hair also, that is so red it could only be Lily's."

"How do you know it's you-know-who is trying to find her?"

"Simple. Once you become very evil you leave ghost like footprints. Seeing as Voldemort is the only one at the time that is evil enough to leave those footprints and there were ghost like footprints by the ingredients, it's obvious that Voldemort is searching for Lily."

"Why?"

"This is the last thing I can answer; we need to send her word right away. Because she is the one that took the book away from him in the first place and one of the only ones who can touch it. Lily has a certain power that none of you have; and if that power is used the wrong way she could become very evil. Only someone like that can touch the book and Voldemort knows that. As long as she is alive the book can still be taken away from him once he gets it. I myself can't touch it. We had to have someone very special bring the book into our library." They stared at him once more, their mouth's slightly open. "Now if you excuse me I must think of a way to fly to Lily without being seen." He started walking away but James stopped him.

"Sir, I have an invisibility cloak that you could use." Dumbeldore sighed a sigh of relief.

"Thank you James. I will take up your offer. Could you please go get it? I will talk to Professor Callahan and borrow a broom and I shall meet you at the front doors." James and Dumbeldore hurried off, leaving Sirius alone in the empty classroom. He ran out the door after James.

The warning

Professor Dumbeldore hopped onto the broom as quick as he could and pulled the invisibility cloak tight around him.

"Good luck sir."

"Thank you James." He then added, "would you like to come along? And Sirius too?" It was actually strange, hearing the voice but not seeing the person. Sirius looked very happy and James was ecstatic.

"Yes sir!" They hopped onto the broom and covered themselves with the cloak. To anyone who was watching, it looked as if the broom was rising by itself and flying quickly off. James prayed that they would get there in time.

~

"So Lily honey, how has Hogmarts been?" Lily laughed.

"Hogwarts, mommy, Hogwarts. And it's great. You wouldn't believe the adventure I had!" It felt so good to be home in the big cozy family room. There were two chairs positioned before a fireplace and a love seat in the middle of them. Her mother and father sat on the love seat and her sister Petunia sat scowling at her in the other chair. It had been many hours since she had gotten home, and since Dumbeldore had set out on his trip.

"Oh really?" Her father raised an eyebrow. "Did you get hurt at all?"

"Oh no not at all. Well the floor did start to turn me into a statue, but it didn't hurt." Lily shrugged her shoulders and laughed on the inside at the horrified look on her parent's faces. "Well it wasn't as bad as what happened to James and Sirius. Voldemort, I mean you-know-who, threw this giant fire ice ball at them. And they were trying to protect me, and that's why they got hurt. I felt so bad afterward. Professor Dumbeldore said they're lucky to be alive after the spell that they had cast on them."

"Who's Professor Dumbeldore?" All of a sudden there was a knock on the door. Lily got up and opened the door. No one was there. She was about to close the door when a voice spoke.

"Lily please don't close the door. It's me, James. And Professor Dumbeldore and Sirius are here too."

"James! Are you wearing your invisibility cloak?"

"Yes."

"Hello Sirius."

"Good to see you Lily, even though you can't see me." He laughed.

"Are you inside? Can I close the door?"

"Yes." Her parents were looking at her strangely. They obviously couldn't hear James and Sirius and Dumbeldore. When the first head appeared in the living room, (which was James's,) Petunia and her mother screamed. James smiled and slid out of the cloak. Next came Sirius and then last Professor Dumbeldore.

"Daddy," she said, "This is Professor Dumbeldore. The headmaster of Hogwarts. And these are my friends James," she pointed to James, "and Sirius." She pointed to Sirius.

"Hi." James said.

"Hello." Sirius chimed after him. Her mother was eyeing them wearily. Lily hugged James, then Sirius and when she got to Dumbeldore he hugged her first.

"Why are you here?"

"Lily, we have bad news. Voldemort is after you. And please don't make me explain: It's a tiring and long story." Lily stared at them. At first she thought it was a joke. But then she realized that James and Sirius and Dumbeldore wouldn't fly all the way from Hogwarts just to make a joke. She didn't know what to say.

"You can come back to Hogwarts if you want Lily. We could keep you company and there's lots of ghosts and teachers there to keep you safe."

"But…but I just got home!"

"Yes Lily but you need to be kept safe."

"Well what about Remus? Won't he go after him too? And what about the broom? I don't have one and I don't think yours can hold four people."

"It is a very possible chance that he might go after Remus, and that is why I am going to him next. And as for the broom," he shrugged his shoulders simply, "I can always make another one."

"None of us know how to fly well enough to make that trip."

"It can be connected to mine." Lily looked at Dumbeldore and her friends, and then at her parents and sister, and then back at Dumbeldore. She sighed.

"Alright. I'll come back to Hogwarts." She hugged her tearful mom and father and waved to her sister. She couldn't go under the invisibility cloak; there wasn't enough room. And it was best for her to be out in the open because she had regular clothes on. When they got outside Lily decided to tell Dumbeldore something.

"Professor Dumbeldore, can I talk to you alone? The bushes rustled and James and Sirius suddenly appeared in them. They walked around to the side of the house so that they couldn't hear what Dumbeldore and Lily said. "I know Remus's secret. I know that he's a werewolf, he told me. If he comes back to Hogwarts with us the trip is going to be have to made during night because we can't all get under the invisibility cloak. Won't he…transform while we're making the trip?" There was silence for a while.

"Lily, I'm glad you thought of that. It is very possible that that will happen. We will have to delay the trip for….three days I believe. Thank you Lily. You can go back into your house. And I suggest that James and Sirius stay with you until I can come pick you up again with Remus. I will tell him by myself. I will go tell Sirius and James to live with you for three days until I return. The bushes rustled a bit and then James and Sirius came into view again after a few moments.

"So we're going to live with you for a few days huh?"

"Yep. Where's Dumbeldore?"

"He already left."

"Oh." They stood there for a while, unsure of what to do. Finally Lily spoke.

"Why don't you come in. We need to tell my parents what's happening so they can do up some rooms for you."

"Ok." Lily opened the door. Her parents looked surprised to see her again.

"Back so soon with your boyfriends Lily?" Petunia grinned wickedly.

Lily glared at her. James raised his wand, but Sirius and Lily both stopped him.

"You know you'll get expelled James."

"So?"

"James," Lily lowered her voice "she says things like that all the time. Don't pay attention to her. She's not worth it." And, grumbling, James lowered his wand.

"Um well we need to stay here for about three more days for a um certain reason. And well James and Sirius live a ways away so they need to live with us for the next few days, if that's alright." James and Sirius nodded their heads vigorously.

"Of course. I'll go and fix up the guestroom. Would you boys like anything to eat?"

"No ma'am we're fine."

"Alright." Lily watched her mother climb the stairs out of sight. Lily's father sat staring at them for a moment and then left also.

"So why exactly is Voldemort after me?"

"Lily! Please call him you-know-who! Please, please, please!"

"Ok. Why is you-know-who after me."

"Well apparently um you have some…well…special powers that none of us have, not even Dumbeldore and you're one of the only ones that can touch the book that you grabbed from you-know-who because he tried to grab it again last night. And well as long as you're alive the book can still be taken away from him. There are very few who can touch that book. If you use your…powers wrong you could be very…well…evil."

"Could be? Hah! Lily is already evil! You are all are evil! All wizards are evil!" Petunia jumped up from her chair and stalked out of the room. Lily looked horrified.

"Evil? I don't want to be evil!"

"You don't have to be. But if you use your powers wrong you will be. So just be careful ok Lily? We wouldn't want you to die."

"Well James wouldn't but I don't know about me…" Lily punched Sirius in the shoulder, not too hard though.

"Ouch! It was just a joke!" Sirius said, rubbing his shoulder and laughing.

"So Lily, Dumbeldore said that he had to delay flying to Hogwarts for three days. Do you know why?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"I'm not allowed to tell, sorry." Lily liked the fact that after she said this they didn't keep on pestering her about what it was.

"That's ok."

"Good." Lily smiled. James kissed her.

"Oh come now don't do that while I'm standing right here!" Sirius complained. They both laughed. "But still I missed you for the about…day that you were gone." Lily laughed.

"Yah I have to admit I missed you too. But you know what? Severus went home for the holidays so when we go back we don't have to worry about anything!"

"Except for the fact that Volde- sorry you-know-who is trying to kill us, and he could sneak into our dormitories while we're sleeping and defenseless, you're right. Nothing to worry about at all!" They all laughed.

The nightmare

That night, Lily had a dream. She was walking around in Hogwarts, and when she walked into her Defense Against the Dark Arts class, no one was there. But she noticed this hole in the wall. She stepped closer to it; and when she did the hole sucked her into it. She was all alone in a pitch black room. She started screaming for James and Sirius and Peter and Remus but no one was there. Suddenly she saw a mirror in front of her. She walked up to it and peered inside. Inside there was her and James a little baby boy.

There was a knock at the door and then James started yelling that it was him, run, run! She grabbed the baby and ran. The mirror went black. And then it was gone. Something grabbed her and held a knife to her throat. It started to cut into it when suddenly she woke up screaming. She sat up straight, tears on her face and trembling. Her curtains were blowing freely in the wind and her door was ajar. But she knew that she had closed it tight. And her door often got stuck; there was no way the wind could have blown it open. Someone or something had been in her room and had left when she woke up. Suddenly, Sirius and James came rushing in.

"What's wrong? Why did you scream?"

"Oh I'm so glad to see you!" She threw her arms around Sirius, since he was the closest one to her. Tears were streaming down her face now. "I had this horrible dream and at the very end, someone was holding a knife to my throat, and when I woke up my door was open, but I know I closed it. I know it!" But James and Sirius weren't looking at her face; they were staring at her throat. She got up and rushed over to her vanity mirror. She looked into it and sure enough, there was a deep red scratch on it. Lily pressed her finger onto it. It was sore and obviously very new. She spun around to face Sirius and James. They were lost for words.

Back to Hogwarts

The days passed quickly. Lily didn't tell her parents or her sister about the dream, just Sirius and James. Before they knew it Dumbeldore was standing on their front steps with Remus and they were all waving good-byes. They had to take off in the back yard; it was too dangerous to do it in plain daytime in the front.

The seating arrangement was this: Dumbeldore and James on the first broomstick, And Sirius and Lily and Remus on the second. They flew back to Hogwarts. The ride was bumpy and the air was cold, but Lily loved it. They were all surprised to see half of the school welcoming them back. Lily rubbed her eyes and blinked many times, making sure that they were all really there. Professor McGongall rushed to Professor Dumbeldore and hugged him. Sirius, Remus, James and Lily all stared. She couldn't help over hearing her say, "Thank goodness, I was so worried. You know you haven't been feeling well recently, you could have died." Tears were streaming down her cheeks. She looked to Sirius and Remus and James. They had heard too.

~

That night, even though she missed her parents, she was so happy to be back at Hogwarts that she laughed until she cried. She loved her familiar bed. She loved the familiar beds around her. She loved the people and the teachers and the common rooms and the castle. She sank into her bed and fell asleep right away.

Lily had the dream again. But this time when she woke up, there was not a scratch on her neck, and her door was not open.

She figured the door wasn't open because the first time it really happened: The second time it did not. She couldn't fall back asleep after that so she crept downstairs into the common room and was surprised to see Remus, James and Sirius were all also sitting by the fire.

"Bad dream?"

"Yes. How did you know?"

"We've all been having bad dreams." Lily just then noticed that all around her were other students from first years to seventh years. It looked like more than half of the house was in the common room. They were in front of the fire and behind chairs and on chairs and under tables and at tables. It was certainly a sight. She took a seat next to James.

"This isn't natural is it?"

"What?"

"For this many people to have a bad dream on the same night."

"I don't think so." Lily got up. She asked people what their dreams were about. They all started out the same way. They walked into The Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom and were sucked into the hole. And then they saw the mirror. That's where the dreams changed. For one there was them falling into a pit of spiders. For another there was being eaten by a vampire. And then they all ended the same way. Someone grabbed them and put a knife to their throat.

"So what did you survey Dr. Smith?" Remus asked, smiling.

"Everyone's dream started out the same way, had a different middle, and then ended the same way."

"That's really weird."

"Tell me about it." Lily, Remus, James and Sirius never left the common room that night; they didn't have enough energy to. Instead they fell asleep by the fire.

~

The next day when Lily saw Professor Dumbeldore in the hall she decided to tell him about the dream.

"Professor! Can I talk to you?"

"Of course my dear Lily."

"Well you know that dream I had a few nights ago? The one where someone was holding a knife to my throat?"

"Yes, what about it?"

"Well last night I had the dream again." Professor Dumbeldore looked worried.

"Lily usually if you have a dream 2 nights in a row it becomes true. Especially when it contains the Dark Lord."

"But that's not the strange part! After the dream I went down into the common room because I couldn't sleep. And I wasn't the only one there. More than half of Gryffindor was there, including Remus, Sirius and James! I asked everyone what their dream was and they all started out the same as mine, but when it got to the part with the mirror, it was different. And then they all ended with someone holding a knife to their throats." Dumbeldore stared at her, looking deeply concerned.

"I'm glad you told me Lily. It seems that Voldemort is haunting your dreams."

"Haunting our dreams? Why?"

"Because when haunting your dreams that same dream will play over

and over in your head until the day you or the haunter dies, unless the haunter chooses to stop. If the same nightmare plays over and over in your head for that long a time you're liable to go crazy very quickly. Voldemort is most likely trying to make you go crazy Lily, but decided to add in the rest of the Gryffindors for his kind of fun."

"I don't want to go crazy!" Lily almost shouted, and Dumbeldore silenced her. "Isn't there any kind of spell to stop it?" She added quietly. He looked thoughtfully at her.

"Well, there is one rather highly advanced spell that can stop it, but you yourself will have to cast it. And James will have to cast it on himself and so would Remus and Sirius and everyone else who are having the nightmares.

"Will you teach it to us? Please Professor Dumbeldore! I don't want to go crazy! I really don't!"

"Well Lily there is more to it than just being highly advanced magic. You also give up one year of your life." Lily stared at him.

"I don't think I understand, sir."

"Say you were going to die next year. Well then because you gave up a year of your life you would die this year instead, for the same reason." Lily blinked many times. She didn't know which was worse, having the same nightmare for the rest of your life, or shortening your life to where you could die tomorrow. "Do you still want to learn the spell?"

"Yes." She said certainly, but she still wasn't sure.

"Alright. I'll put you in charge of bringing any student that wants to learn the spell into the great hall tonight at 8:00."

"Yes sir." Lily walked away, her stomach turning. She headed to the common room, not paying much attention. She bumped twice into Professor McGongall, once into a nasty Slytherien, and once more into Professor Quirrell. Finally she reached the portrait of the fat lady.

"Password?"

"Mockamumps." The portrait swung open and Lily stepped inside. James and Sirius were doing homework together at a table and Remus was reading a book by the fire. They all looked up when she walked in. Lily sat down gloomily in the chair next Remus and sighed, closing her eyes.

"Lil what's wrong?" It was the first time that Lily had ever been called by a nickname and she had a feeling it would be that way for awhile.

"The dream. That's what's wrong." They all stared at her. "Voldemort is haunting our dreams. He's trying to make us go insane." She said furiously. Lily didn't know why but she was getting very angry. "And the only way to stop it is if we die, he dies or we do a spell where we give up a year of our life." She didn't even care that the boys flinched when she said Voldemort. "And for some reason I told Dumbeldore I would do the spell and give up a year of my life. Now I have to find others who want to do the spell too. And it might not even work. It's highly advanced magic." She said "highly advanced magic" in a menacing tone. Remus, Sirius, and James were looking at her strangely. They had never seen her mad before. The whole common room stopped to hear about the spell.

"Well?" She shouted, jumping to her feet. "Isn't there anyone else who wants to waste a year of their life so they don't have nightmares?" She yelled. Her cheeks were red with fury. No one said anything. She waved her hands hopelessly in the air and, breaking into sobbing, ran up to the girls dormitory. James, Sirius and Remus looked at each other. No one knew what to do. James stood up. He headed for the girl's dormitory and got to the stairs when a voice broke out.

"James!" Crystal squealed. "You're not allowed up there!"

"So?" He continued up the stairs and out of sight. James didn't know where Lily's bed was. All he knew was that he heard soft crying. He kept going up the stairs, luckily seeing no girls at all. Finally he reached the last set of stairs and climbed them. There were 5 beds. 4 of them contained nothing, but one of them contained Lily. She hadn't even noticed that he had entered the room. "Lily?" He called softly. Lily sat straight up.

"James? You're not allowed in here!" James laughed.

"That's what everyone else said too." Suddenly, a voice called out from right outside the door.

"Everyone decent?" It was Sirius. Lily couldn't help but laugh at his tone of voice. Hearing no answer, his head popped around the corner and moments after Remus's.

"Professor McGongall will have your heads if she finds out about this!" Lily said, but she was smiling.

"I don't think she'll find out about it." They stepped into the room and came and sat down next to James and Lily.

"Why?" Lily asked.

"Why what?"

"Why is that we're the ones that have to give up a year of our life so we don't have nightmares? Why are we the ones that Voldemort's after? Why are we the ones that Severus hates?" James sighed.

"I guess that's just life."

"Yah well," Lily put her head on James's shoulder, "I don't think I like it very much."

"Sometimes neither do I Lily, but soon better things will happen. They always do." Remus replied. "And some of us, have other problems too." He smiled at Lily mischievously, and she smiled back.

"Thanks for talking sense into me. I don't know why I got so mad."

"That's ok. We all do sometimes. It was actually kind of funny; I've never seen you get mad before."

"Yes, well," Lily grinned wickedly at James, "you haven't seen me really mad yet. No one except my family has seen me really mad." Everyone laughed.

"We'll meet you downstairs." Sirius and Remus headed off downstairs.

"Are you all better now?" James asked, smiling.

"All better." Lily stared at James and James stared at Lily. They were completely lost in each other's eyes. And then she kissed him. For some reason the kiss seamed deeper than usual. James seemed to notice too. The kiss lasted for a good while, and that was when Lily realized that she loved him. When they broke off, she wanted to kiss him again, but she didn't. They headed downstairs.

Mawang Lantalino!

"Lily?" a boy she knew to be Arthur Weasley approached her. "Um…about what you said about the spell…I'll learn it too."

"Ok. Meet Professor Dumbeldore at 8:00 in the great hall."

"Ok."

"Lily? We all will too." Sirius, Remus and James volunteered.

"Thank you. Meet Professor Dumbeldore in the great hall at 8:00."

Throughout the whole day people approached her nervously and said they wanted to learn the spell too, including a girl named Crystal that she enjoyed talking to during night. And Lily would tell them were to go. Finally, 8:00 came and most of the Gryffindor house was assembled in the great hall. Curious Huffelpuffs, Slytheriens and Ravenclaws passed many times, and Lily noticed a lot of them were the same people, trying to hear what was going on.

"Is everyone here?" Professor Dumbeldore asked. No one answered. "Uh…right well you are all here to learn a spell to cure you of your nightmares. I'm sure you are all fully aware that this spell will take one year off your life, and if you are just now learning this and wish to leave, you may do so now." No one left. "Alright. This spell is highly advanced magic. First I want everyone to wave their wands like this." He showed a complicated sort of wiggle. Many of the passing students had stopped to watch, amazed at hearing the price of the spell. Everyone started trying it. Dumbeldore walked around surveying everyone's work, correcting those who had it wrong and complimenting those who had it right.

"Good! Now say Mawang Lantalino." The voices all chorused, "Mawang Lantalino." "Good! Now put the two together. If the spell is performed correctly a green light should flash out of your wound and surround you. I must warn you, your insides will feel rather peculiar. It won't hurt but it will feel peculiar. I don't think many of you will be able to do it, especially on your first try, but it's worth a shot." Lily did the wiggle and said the words. Nothing happened. She tried again. Nothing. She looked to Sirius and James and Remus. Suddenly, something green shot out of Sirius's wand. It surrounded him. Sirius got a strange look on his face and then the light was gone.

"What did it feel like?"

"I…I can't explain it." Lily got ready to try again. She knew that if Sirius could do it she could too. Concentrating as hard as she could, she did the wiggle and muttered the words. To her delight something green came out of her wand and surrounded her. Sirius was right; there was no way to explain the feeling. It was like her insides were swirling together. She couldn't feel her legs and she couldn't feel her feet. It felt like she was floating, without any bones or any insides or anything but skin. And then the green light went away and she felt normal again. Her head was spinning.

"You're right Sirius." She said. "There is no way to describe it." Lily looked around. It looked like Sirius, her and two seventh years were the only ones to succeed so far. Eventually James, Remus, three other first years, two second years, one third year, five fourth years, four fifth years, nine sixth years and finally eleven seventh years actually performed it correctly. Dumbeldore looked very proud.

The Letter

October turned into November. Peter returned, but unfortunately, so did Severus. During the breakfast the day that Peter returned Remus, Sirius, James and Lily started telling him all about the nightmares and the cut on Lily's throat when she woke up and Voldemort being after Remus, Sirius, James and Lily. Severus, who was sitting right behind James, heard it all.

"You actually gave up a whole year of your life so you wouldn't have a nightmare? That's pathetic!"

"You don't know what that nightmare's like Severus. It comes straight from Voldemort." Lily stared at James in shock. She had never heard him say Voldemort before. Although he did flinch when he said it, so did Severus.

"What did you say that name for?" He complained loudly.

"I don't really think be people should be afraid of a name."

"Yah well just don't say it when I'm around. Scowling he turned back to his breakfast.

"Well that's one way to get rid of him." James whispered to everyone else. They all laughed. Lily had been having such a good time talking she hadn't even noticed that a big bulky gray owl had dropped a small letter into her cereal. She pulled out the soggy envelope, dripping with pink colored milk. She tore it open. Inside was a letter. It read:

The dark lord will rise. The dark lord will prevail. All shall be conquered. No one can stop him. Ever. The dark lord will rise. The dark lord will prevail. You will be conquered first.

Lily stared at the letter, transfixed.

"What is it Lil?" Lily handed the letter to Remus. He read it, wide eyed. Not taking his eyes off the letter he handed it to Sirius. Sirius read it and handed it to James. James read it and handed it to Peter. Peter read it and handed it to Lily.

"That's not good."

"You need to show Professor Dumbeldore right away Lily. This is serious." Lily noticed that beneath it there was more small writing.

Ot evas eht tneconni, raef ylno raef flesti.

"What the…? There's more writing. It says, Ot evas eht tneconni, raef ylno raef flesti. What does that mean?"

"I don't know. That's very strange. I can look it up in the library but that doesn't sound like any language I know."

"That's ok Remus." Lessons that day went by very quickly it seemed. Professor Quirrell had to tell her to wake up twice in class. As soon as dinner was over she rushed up to the restroom, letter still in her hand. She set down the letter on the counter in front of the mirror and splashed some water onto her face. Lily looked up at the mirror. This has been a very bad day. She thought to herself. Lily stared into the mirror, but not at herself, at the note. Ot evas eht tneconni, raef ylno raef flesti. To save innocent, fear only fear itself. Of course! It was written backwards! She grabbed the note and holding it tightly ran downstairs. By the time she reached the common room she was out of breath. She plopped down into a chair and handed the letter to Sirius. "Backwards!" She muttered breathlessly.

"Backwards?"

"Read the note backwards!"

"Oh. To s…save the innocent, f…f…fear on…only fear …itself. To save the innocent, fear only fear itself. I don't get it." Remus stood up, excited.

"I do! It means to free the slaves Volde-Voldemort… to free his slaves don't fear him! Good job Lil! Lets go tell Professor Dumbeldore!" They ran to Professor McGongall's office.

"We…we…need to see…Professor…Dumbeldore!" James exclaimed, rather loudly and panting.

"Good heavens! Calm down! Why do you need to see him so badly?" Lily handed her the letter.

"Read the last part backwards!" Professor McGongall did so.

"Who does this belong to?"

"Me."

"Lily why don't you come with me to see Professor Dumbeldore." Professor McGongall walked out of her office and Lily followed, leaving Sirius, Peter, Remus and James behind.

When they finally reached his office, the first thing Professor McGongall did was thrust the letter into a very confused Professor Dumbeldore's face.

"Read the last part backwards." She said. Dumbeldore read the note, and you could see some confusion on his face at one point, obviously were he was trying to read it backwards.

"Who does this belong too?"

"Lily."

"Remus took a guess that it means that to free Voldemort's slaves you just need to not be afraid of him."

"I believe this is what the letter means, but there is no way to be sure."

~

"Well? What do you think the letter means James?" James thought.

"Same thing as what Remus said." James suddenly thought back to his first day and jumped up from the chair he had been sitting in.

"James what wrong?"

"I'll be right back." James started running to the boy's dormitory in Gryffindor common room. Oh I hope I didn't throw it away. Please! It has to still be there!" He rounded a corner and went into his bedroom. He threw open the lid of his trunk and started shuffling around desperately. At the very bottom he saw a note neatly folded. He grabbed it, unfolded it, and read,

The dark lord will rise. The dark lord will prevail. All shall be conquered. No one can stop him. Ever. The dark lord will rise. The dark lord will prevail.

It was the same letter Lily had gotten. He searched at the bottom and saw more writing.

Yllil lliw eb eht tsrif ot ied. Ouy lliw eb dnoces. Ot evas eht tneconni eveileb ni evol.

James read it backwards. Lily will be the first to die. You will be second. To save the innocent believe in love. Believe in love? James grabbed the letter and returned to Professor McGongall's office. He handed the letter to Remus first.

"I got the same one! But the bottom's different."

"What does it say? I hate reading backward."

"It says Lily will be the first to die. You will be second. To save the innocent believe in love."

"Believe in love?"

"I don't know."

"You should wait here until Professor McGongall gets back. She can take you to Dumbeldore." James hesitated and looked around, not sure whether he should go to Professor Dumbeldore's office right away or not. Finally he sat down.

~

"Lily I…" Professor McGongall stopped and stared at Lily. Suddenly she bent down and hugged her. She whispered into her ear, "I'm so sorry Volde-you-know-who is after you. A child as young as yourself shouldn't have to worry about these things." When Lily looked at Professor McGongall's face after she let go, she almost began crying. She looked at Lily so hopelessly, and Lily knew there was nothing she could do. Professor McGongall opened the door to her office and led Lily in. James hopped out of his chair and handed Professor McGongall the letter.

"I got this on my first day. It's the same as Lily's, but at the bottom it says to save the innocent believe in love." Remus and Sirius were looking sorrowfully at the letters, as if they were their friend's death notes. Peter didn't seem to want to look at them at all. Professor McGongall scowled slightly at James.

"You should have given this to me right away, Potter. But I will excuse you this time. And this time only." James swallowed hard and nodded. Professor McGongall looked thoughtfully at the letters.

"Neither one of you are to walk in the halls alone or be out of the school by 6:00." Sirius, Remus, James and Peter stared at her, horrified.

"You wouldn't! Professor McGongall, you can't! That's torture! We like to visit Hagrid in the evenings and…"

"I said you will not walk through the halls alone and you will not be out of the castle by 6:00. Now back to your dormitories." Everyone headed back rather gloomily.

"You guys, I'm sorry. I...I feel like this is all my fault and well..."

"Lil it's not your fault. You didn't know Professor McGongall would give us those...consequences." Lily bit her lip.

"Still...I'm sorry."

"That's ok." Sirius commented, but he didn't sound ok at all.

~

The teachers were finding all kinds of ways to make sure there were many people walking with them in the hall.

Whenever they wanted to see Hagrid they had to send him an owl in advance and wait for him to pick them up in the castle, instead of them going out to see him, and the trip had to end right away at 5:30 so that they could be safely back in the castle by 6:00. The change was horrible, but Lily had to admit she felt safer this way. These ways went on for weeks and weeks from late November into early December. And then it all changed.

"Everyone! Back to your common rooms right away!" Professor McGongall's voice was being magnified so that everyone in the castle could hear. Lily looked to James, Sirius, Remus and Peter, concerned, and they looked just as clueless as she did. They headed back to the common room at a trot. Professor McGongall reached it only moments after they did. She looked very sad.

"Students, I am sorry to inform you that Crystal Alley, a first year Gryffindor has died at the hand of Voldemort." Lily went very white. Crystal had been the only girl friend that she had had, and now she was dead. The boys knew she had been friends with Crystal and they stared at her. Remus was the first to move. He grabbed her and pulled her into a hug. If Lily would have been able to see she would have been proud to notice that James didn't look jealous at all, he looked concerned and sorry. Lily started to cry. She was glad Remus was there. She needed someone to hold onto. They moved over to a chair in front of the fire and sat down. Sirius James and Peter followed, all still looking very sad. They had known Crystal also, but not as well as Lily. James and Sirius sat in the chair next to Remus and Lily and Peter sat in the chair on the other side of them. No one spoke for a long time. They all just sat there, the only ones in the common room. Everyone else was in their dormitory, seeing as it was now 12:00 at night. The only sound was Lily's muffled crying, and a soft snoring from Peter.

~

The funeral was held 2 days after her death. It was the Christmas holidays, so not very many students were there to go to it. Lily started crying again, and Sirius looked close to it.

~

"This sucks." Sirius said, pulling the sheets up higher in his bed.

"I know."

"I wish there was some way to cheer everyone up." James face brightened a little.

"I think there is."

"What?"

"What makes you laugh?"

"Jokes?"

"Exactly!"

"James, are you suggesting we become jokesters?"

"NO. Of course not! Yes Remus, I'm suggesting we be jokers. It's lots of fun, I was one in my old school." James smiled vaguely.

"I'm in." Sirius said, smiling.

"So am I then." Remus added. Everyone looked to Peter, who sighed reluctantly.

"Fine. I'll do it too." They all cheered. It was the first happiness that had been heard through out the whole castle for the first time in days.

~

The Water Catastrophe

They decided to start next day during transfiguration.

"When changing a solid object you must always make sure to..." Lily stared at the boys. They had chosen seats right in the back, and were now huddled together talking intently. "And if you do not tap a solid object twice there would be major consequences." Remus raised his hand.

"Like what?"

"Well for one your object would turn to liquid. And the liquid would not stop until you tapped the object it was coming from two times. And no magic can stop it. Like I was saying..." James motioned Lily closer. She leaned in.

"You might want to bring your feet off the ground." He whispered, grinning slyly at her. Lily was puzzled. Bring my feet off the ground? She did so a little, all the while looking at James. He smiled at her, the kind of smile that said, that's-very-smart-of-you-to-do.

"Now I want everyone to try it." James, Remus, Peter and Sirius smiled at each other and then tapped their objects twice. The teapots they had been trying to change into tortoises suddenly instead started pouring tons of water out of them. Lily suddenly understood. Bring your feet off the ground! She laughed gleefully, as were most of the rest of the students in the classroom. The classroom had been turned into a swimming pool! Professor McGongall looked furious.

"Stop this insanity this instant! As soon as I find out who did this..." But no one was listening. They were playing in the water. Suddenly a huge wave washed over Lily, nearly knocking her over. She looked around. James, Sirius, Remus and Peter were pointing at her laughing. Lily, smiling, picked up her wand and made on just as big, if not bigger and splashed it onto the boys. They looked shock.

"Just a little something I learned in A standard book of spells. You're right, Remus, reading is important!" They all laughed. Even Professor McGongall seemed to be calming down and enjoying the water, even though she was standing on her desk. She saw the waves that Lily, Remus, Sirius, James and Peter had thrown at each other, and with a delightful expression on her face she threw one back at them twice the size of the ones they had made...put together! They were drenched, but Professor McGongall was laughing.

"Alright. We've had some fun. Whoever started this please stop it. No punishments." Sirius Remus James and Peter tapped their teapots. Professor McGongall vanished the water and she spent the rest of the lesson using a drying spell on all of her students. But she looked happy for the first time since Crystal had died.

The news of the swimming pool classroom spread quickly and soon many other first years were trying it. Professor McGongall started to get annoyed. She let everyone know one day at lunch in late December, close to Christmas.

"Would all of my students please stop turning solid objects into liquid? It was funny the first few times but now it's getting old. Also Hogsmeade visits for all the students will be tomorrow." Everyone started talking excitedly.

"What's Hogsmeade?" Lily asked, taking a bite out of a piece of buttered bread.

"It's this great wizard's town. They've got all sorts of cool shops."

"Sounds like fun."

"Yeah. I need to go Christmas shopping still."

"Me too." Everyone nodded their agreement.

Hogsmeade

It was a perfect day for Christmas shopping. There was snow falling outside, although not too much. It was cold enough that they had to wear cloaks and scarves and talk to keep warm. Sirius and Remus were walking next to each other, talking about the next trick they were planning on pulling in Defense Against the Dark Arts. Peter was walking behind them, chiming in every now and then. James and Lily were walking together and James had his arm around Lily. They were talking about what they were going to buy everyone else for Christmas and also the kind of shops that were in Hogsmeade. The moment they got there Remus and Sirius started running towards a place called Zonkos. Sirius stopped turned around and shouted to James, Lily and Peter,

"Meet us at the Three Broomsticks when you're done shopping for some Butterbeer!" He then ran in after Remus. Peter looked around then ran off into Honeydukes. James kissed her.

"I can't shop with you because I don't want you to see what I'm getting you." He grinned slyly at her and ran into Zonkos, leaving Lily alone in the snow. She finally headed towards a shop called, Mona and Bert's Gift Shop. She wasn't surprised to see many other students in the shop, no doubt looking for gifts as well. Lily had no clue what to buy them. Finally she settled on a book called, 201 spells for the wizard trickster for Sirius, a candy making kit for Peter, some levitating shoes for Remus and (even though she knew first years weren't aloud to have them,) a new silversweep broom for James. It was the newest model. She headed towards the three broomsticks. When she opened the door she realized how hungry she was when she smelled all the delicious scents. Hagrid and Professor McGongall were sitting at the counter, sipping some drink that Lily had never seen before. At the very back table sat Remus and Sirius talking excitedly. Lily walked over to the table. When she got there they stopped talking, smiled and said hello, and then went back to talking.

"Like I was saying, I got James a robe that changes color every two minutes and then I got Peter a bag of exploding city."

"Are you going to tell him it's exploding city?" Remus grinned evilly at Sirius.

"And miss seeing the expression on his face when he pops a few of those in his mouth? No way!" They both laughed.

"What did you get them Lil?"

"Oh well I got Peter a kit to make candy and I got James a broom." Remus's jaw dropped.

"Are you serious? A broom? What kind?" Sirius asked excitedly.

"The new Silversweep."

"James is a lucky guy alright." Remus looked thoughtfully at Lily. "And I'm sure that whatever you got us is just as good." He beamed a smile at her. Lily felt relieved. Suddenly the door opened and Peter stepped in carrying a bag that looked way too big for him. No one helped him, but they flagged him down waving their arms. He walked over, and, puffing, set down his bag on the floor. He then took the seat next to Lily. A waitress passed and Remus stopped her.

"Can we have five butterbeers?" He asked very politely, beating his eyelashes and folding his hands on the table. Lily, Sirius and Peter tried not to laugh.

"Sure thing 'hun." She answered and walked away.

"Five?"

"Yah." Remus shrugged his shoulders. "One for James when he gets here." Right on the word, "James", James stepped through the door it, grinning, walked over to their table and sat down next to Peter.

"I found you the best presents possible." He grinned.

"You should hear what Lil' got you!" Sirius muttered.

"What?"

"Oh nothing." The waitress came and placed five butterbeers on their table and then walked off. Lily took a sip. It warmed all her insides and tasted wonderful. She was the last one to put down her glass. When she did she started to laugh. James, Sirius, Remus and Peter looked at her strangely. She pointed to Remus. Remus looked surprised. Everyone else started laughing too.

"Got a little something on you face there Remus." Lily said, trying not to laugh. Remus flicked his wand and made a mirror appear. Upon looking in it he realized that butterbeer foam had made a mustache and beard on his face. He laughed too, but his face was very red. He picked up a napkin and wiped it off.

Remus suddenly looked like he had an idea. No one knew that he was flicking his wand under the table. He pursed his lips, trying not to laugh.

"You don't look so good yourself Lil'." He managed to say before breaking down into laughter. He pushed the mirror towards her. Lily took it reluctantly and looked at her face. On it a foam mustache and beard even bigger then Remus's was appearing on her face. And she couldn't wipe it off! James, Sirius, Remus and Peter were in tears from laughing so hard. The other bad part was that it wasn't stopping it's growing. Professor McGongall and Hagrid were looking over too and couldn't help laughing also.

"Remus!" She said. "Make it right again PLEASE! I don't like looking like a man." She smiled. Remus's head was on the table. He couldn't look at her he was laughing so hard. He waved his wand and it started going away. She glared at him in a friendly way and flicked her wand under the table. Remus's hair was suddenly sorted into 2 pigtails tied with pink bows. Sirius, James and Peter started to laugh, but Lily put a finger to her lips. Professor McGongall shook her head, but she was smiling. She and Hagrid turned back to their drinks.

"Now that's the kind of girl I like." James whispered, smiling at her. "But of course I like you the other way too." The day had been perfect. Nothing had gone wrong. Dinner was delicious, (like always) and it was even more enjoyable seeing Remus's hair in pigtails.

That night after Lily had wrapped all her packages and she lay in bed, stuffed and happy, she realized, Remus now knew.

"LILY SMITH!" Remus shouted, even though it was well past 12:00. She awoke with a start, wondering why he had yelled her name. Then she remembered, and started laughing. She was about to go down to the common room, but they came to her first. When the boys entered the rest of the girls sank lower into their sheets and screamed. One even hit Sirius with a pillow, screaming pervert before running into the restroom that was on their floor, trying to get away from being seen. All of the rest of the girls, (except Lily) ran in after her. They closed the door and they heard it lock.

"I have a feeling we're not wanted here."

"Pigtails? PIGTAILS?! ALL DAY LONG???" Lily, James, Peter and Sirius were all laughing. And then he surprised all of them. "That was such a good trick! I didn't know you had it in you! Congratulations!" He hugged her. Lily was shocked.

"You're not embarrassed?"

"No I'm very humiliated and I probably won't leave my dormitory for a week, but that was a good trick all the same!" He said it very truthfully.

"Remus, you are the weirdest boy I know. No I take that back, you're one of the weirdest person I know." She said 'one' while looking at Sirius, James and Peter.

"Well, goodnight."

"Wait! Before you go, here's your presents." She handed them out and they all gave her a hearty thank you. Except for James, he gave her a kiss.

"Goodnight Lily."

"Good night everyone." Everyone left except James.

"I want to tell you something. It's really stupid but...but... I think that Remus is a werewolf." She stared at him, trying to look surprised.

"What makes you think that?"

"He's always gone on the full moon. What do you think?" Lily looked down and bit her lip. If she told him he was right, she wouldn't have told anyone, he would have guessed. But it still was like telling him if she told him he was right. Lily decided quickly.

"I think...I think that you're right James."

"He's a werewolf?"

"Maybe."

"He is! I knew it!"

"You can't tell anyone James! He doesn't want anyone to know because he's afraid that you won't want to be his friend."

"That's stupid. Of course I still want to be his friend!"

"Well he doesn't know that. And don't go telling him you still want to be his friend, he'll think that I told you."

"But you didn't tell me! I figured it out myself!"

"What about Peter and Sirius?"

"They can figure it out themselves. I won't tell anyone but Remus. Tomorrow I'll tell him I figured it out myself."

"Alright. Don't even mention my name though, ok?"

"Sure thing Lil'." He kissed her again. "Goodnight."

"Goodnight." All of this was said in whispers to make sure that the girls hiding in the bathroom could not hear. James walked out of the dormitory. Lily looked back to the restroom. The door was opened just a crack and ten eyes were staring out at her. They all left, staring at Lily. "Why is everyone staring at me?"

"Lily, James just kissed you!" Lily was confused.

"Yeah, so?"

"So Lily you just got your first kiss!"

"No I didn't."

"Well then you just got your first kiss with James!"

"No I didn't."

"You didn't? You and James have kissed before?"

"Yes, why?" They all started chanting, 'Lily's got a boyfriend, Lily's got a boyfriend!'

~

James heard something while walking down the stairs by himself, despite the stares of other girls. He strained to hear it.

"Lily's got a boyfriend, Lily's got a boyfriend!"

"Stop it!"

"Lily's got a boyfriend, Lily's got a boyfriend!"

"Be quiet!" James frowned. They were obviously making fun of Lily and she wasn't enjoying it. He suddenly grinned to himself and rushed off to the boy's dormitory. He had an idea.

~

"AAAHHHH!" A bloodcurdling scream came from the Gryffindor girl's dormitory. James, Remus, Peter and Sirius sat straight up and started laughing. In the girl's dormitory, one girl had woken up like she always did, but five others were having some problems. One had woken to find spiders (not poisonous, but she didn't know that) crawling around in her bed, one was loosing hair quickly, another had a mustache and beard growing from their face, another one's hair was in a large spike and kept changing from red to blue to green, and the last girl's hair was growing so long she couldn't even see.

"Lily Smith how dare you!" The girl with the spiders in her bed shrieked. Lily was laughing.

"It wasn't me. It was my..." Lily thought of something quickly, "powers! When I get mad my powers get mad and they do things like this!"

"Powers, hah! You don't have any powers! It was probably those stupid trouble-making friends of yours and your ugly boyfriend! Severus is right about all of them!" Lily rose.

"Don't you dare talk about them like that! If you do that again..." She was so mad her face was turning red. She ran out into the common room. She had been known to do very bad things when she got mad. James, Sirius, Remus and Peter were waiting for her.

"You didn't have to do that." Lily said, but she was laughing.

"Yes we did." James smiled.

"Yes. We powers get very mad when those kind of things happen to our master."

"How did you know about that?"

"Oh I guess you could say we just have really good hearing."

"Or that we put a ear globe next to your bed. We had to listen to everything that was going on."

"Yes we wouldn't miss it for the world."

"You know how much trouble your going to be in, don't you?"

"Trouble? No way! There's no proof that we did it!" Lily grinned at

them. "You are the weirdest, yet somehow nicest boys I know." They all grinned.

"The jokers, at your service." Remus said, going down into a low bow, taking off his witch's hat while doing so, and then placing it back on his head after the bow had finished.

"I bet they're glad there's no lessons today. They would die if they were to be seen in public like that." Sirius commented, rolling his eyes. Suddenly, 10 feet were heard pounding down the girl's dormitory's stairs. The five girls emerged. The one in the front, who was obviously the leader of their little gang walked up to James, (who was the first person she saw) and slapped him. She started literally screaming in his face what a lousy, low life piece of scum he was…

Remus, Lily, Sirius and Peter stepped back. They had all gotten the same idea at the same time. Sirius nodded and ran up to the boy's dormitory and came back with the invisibility cloak. They slipped under it. Lily reached forward and pinched the 'leader' in the back. She grabbed at her back, missing Lily's hand by seconds. She whirled around. She glared at the space dubiously and then turned back around to lecture James some more. Sirius tapped her on the shoulder. The girl whirled around.

"Alright! I know someone is there! Show yourself!" She shrieked. Nothing happened.

"Come off it! I know you're there!" Another one of them shouted, even though she had no idea what they were talking about. James was trying hard not to laugh. After the girl turned back around very doubtfully, Remus reached out and tugged on her hair. The girl screamed like it hurt more than anything.

"You know I have these powers that get mad when I do…" James started, but he couldn't finish, he was laughing so hard.

"Ok Lily! Ok Sirius! Ok Remus! Ok Peter! I know you're there! Show yourselves! This weakling has no powers. You're there I just know you're there!" This time the girl didn't turn around. They snuck around to behind her. Peter reached his foot out and stepped on her heal.

"Oh James that was so obvious that…" The girl stopped. No one was there anymore. He had hidden himself under the invisibility cloak with his friends. He thanked the lord that his mother had gotten him a x-x-x-large size. "James! Show yourself right now or I'll… I'll… tell Professor McGongall!!!"

"Tell her what?" Sirius said, trying to disguise his voice. "That a bunch of mysterious voices…" he stopped.

"Are pinching you in the back?" Lily finished.

"And pulling you hair." Remus added.

"And stepping on your heels." Peter squeaked.

"And disappearing from sight?" James added. The whole time they had walked around the girls in a circle, so that they could sound like they were all over the place.

"Oh James. It's so obvious that's it's you and your friends." The leader said, but her face was twisted with fear.

"Is that so?" Lily asked.

"Y…yes." The girl said uncertainly. One of the girl's faces brightened. She ran over to the leader and whispered something into her ear.

"It's obvious that you're wearing an…what?" She whispered. "Invisibility cloak James. It's the only explanation."

"Really?" Remus said in a know it all tone.

"Christine." Lily called to the girl who was whispering. "You can stop telling her what to say. Just because you might be the smartest one of the group doesn't mean that you can tell her what to say." The girl stopped abruptly and walked back to her place next to her friends.

"You know what this is way too freaky I am out of here." The leader left and all the girls followed.

"That was so mean! Did you see how scared she was?" Lily said but she was curled up in a chair laughing so hard that it hurt.

"Oh yeah that was priceless! The jokers strike again!"

"I don't know how I'm going to live with you guys now that you're jokers. You're IMPOSSIBLE!"

"Good!"

That morning at breakfast, Remus got the same letter as Lily and James. Only his said at the bottom, (when being read backward)

Listen not to Fear. To save the innocent you mustn't be afraid of your differences and obstacles.

The letter seemed to dampen everyone's spirits that day. Especially Remus's. Lily wasn't sure if James telling Remus that he knew he was a werewolf was a good idea for that night. She told him so, and James jut waved his hand.

"It's as good a day as any. If I don't tell him now I'm just going to keep putting it off." And then he walked off towards his dormitory where Remus was, alone.

~

"Hey Remus." Remus looked up from his book.

"Hi James." He went back to reading. James sat down on his bed next to him.

"Uh Remus?"

"Yeah?"

"Um…well…I know that…I know that…that you're a werewolf." Remus stared at him.

"What? Lily told you…?"

"No! Lily didn't tell me! I figured it out myself."

"I suppose you told Sirius and Peter?"

"No."

"You know I hear that Arthur Weasley is really nice."

"Yeah why?"

"Well now that you know you're not going to be my friend. Thought I might as well give you some suggestions of a few nice people."

"Remus." James sighed. "I still want to be your friend. And if you would let Sirius and Peter know I'm sure they all will want to be too." Remus looked doubtful.

"I don't know James…"

"Hey even if they don't, which I'm sure they will, you still have Lily and I." Remus still looked doubtful.

"Well James if you really need to I'm not stopping you."

"So I can? Thanks Remus."

"Yeah no problem." Remus looked like he wished the subject would change.

"So what all did you get at Zonkos? Plenty of Dungbombs I hope?" Remus's face brightened.

"Oh yeah! I got tons! And some fireworks and biting teacups it…" He went on and on.

"Wow Remus!" James said, cutting him short. "That's quite a load!"

"Yep. We need to have as many as possible." He smiled. "So what is that you got Lil'? You said it was really good."

"I will tell no one." James grinned mischievously.

"Fine. I guess I'll have to wait for, lets see, one more day."

"Guess you will."

"Ok I have to go down to the common room. I left one of my books there."

"Another one? How many are you reading?" Remus smiled sheepishly.

"Eight."

"Eight!?!"

"Four of them are books of jokes though."

"Hmm…I suppose I can forgive you then." Remus punched James in the shoulder playfully and then headed down to the common room.

~

What he found surprised him. Lily was holding a letter in her hand and was crying.

"Lil' what's wrong?" Remus rushed over to her. Lily said nothing, just jabbed a letter into Remus's face. Remus read out loud,

Dear Lily,

I'm so sorry to tell you this darling and I don't know how to either. You're father has had a heart attack and well…you know how weak his heart is. He didn't survive it. We're holding the funeral two days after New Years. Please tell me if you can come.

Love always,

Your mother and Sister

He stared at Lily in shock. Only he and Peter really knew what it was like to no longer have a or both parents.

"Lily I'm…" Remus didn't know how to finish. "I'm so sorry Lil'."

"It's not your fault." She sniffed. "I mean I definitely wouldn't blame you. You…you know what it's like." The portrait swung open and Sirius stepped in. He looked first at Lily, curiosity and sympathy on his face. He then looked to Remus, eyebrows raised. Her dad died. He mouthed to him. How? He mouthed back. Heart attack. Sirius nodded.

"Lily, are you…are you ok?"

"Yah I'm fine." She sniffed. Suddenly James appeared at the entrance of the boy's dormitory.

"Hey Remus I didn't know it would take you so long to…" He stopped abruptly when he saw Lily. "What's wrong Lil'?"

"My dad! He…he died!"

"That's horrible! How did he die?"

"A heart attack. I'm sorry but I'm going to bed. I can't take it awake, maybe it will be better when I'm asleep." And with that she rushed into her dormitory. Lily had never gone to bed on Christmas Eve in worse spirits.

~

The Necklace of Erised

Lily woke up, but with her eyes closed. When she opened them the very first thing she saw was Sirius's face. She almost screamed, then caught herself, telling herself who it was. He smiled.

"We thought we should all bring our presents down and open them together. Or we can open them in here. Or in the boy's dormitory." Lily looked onto the foot of her bed, and sure enough, there was a pile of presents at the end of it.

"Common room please." Sirius smiled again.

"Want some help with those? There's an awful lot."

"Sure." Sirius grabbed three of the five packages and headed downstairs, despite the screams of many other girls. Lily picked up the remaining two and followed.

In the common room, James, Remus and Peter were sitting by the fire staring at their presents waiting to be opened. Sirius sat down next to a pile, obviously his.

"She's here we can start now." Peter lunged at his presents, Remus started ripping the bow off of one he had already been holding and James was already opening his second present. Lily grabbed one and checked the tag. To: Lily From: Sirius. She eyed him suspiciously before opening it. Inside she found not a joke but a lovely pink rose. He turned toward her.

"It's a very special rose." He commented. "No matter what it will never die."

"Thank you Sirius it's wonderful!" She hugged him and started on the second present, but was stopped by James.

"OY! A broomstick! Who got this for me?" He started shuffling madly through the ripped off wrapping paper to find the tag. He saw her mouth the word, Lily. "Lily! I…wow…thank…I never…this is…wow!" James was stuttering so badly that he couldn't even get out a sentence. Lily laughed. "And it's a real Silversweep too! A REAL SILVERSWEEP!" Was the first sentence he managed to get out.

"Glad you like it!"

"Like it! I love it!"

"Good!" He reached over and gave her a peck on the cheek.

"Thank you Lil'."

"No problem." She went back to her package, (which from Peter.) and when finally opening noticed that he had bought her a bag of Bertie Botts Every Flavor Beans. Seeing them she couldn't help think about how they had met on the train to Hogwarts. "Thanks Peter. They're great."

"Glad you like them." Lily looked to Remus. He was pulling out her pair of sneakers.

"Uh wow! Thanks I love sneakers!" Lily rolled her eyes.

"Don't sound so excited!"

"Sorry."

"Oh and by the way, they're levitating sneakers."

"THEY ARE? COOL! Thanks Lil'!"

"Your welcome." She picked up another package. This one was from her mother and her sister. They had bought her a pair of fancy shoes and a dress. Which wouldn't come in very handy at Hogwarts, seeing as she had to wear robes. The next package she picked up was from Remus. There was a book of Highly Advanced Spells inside of it. "Thanks Remus!"

"You're welcome." The next present she opened was the last one and it was from James. Inside she found a tiny box. When she opened the box, she found a beautiful golden locket. She gasped.

"James it's beautiful!"

"There's more. Open it. What do you see?" Lily opened the locket. Inside she found a small mirror. When looking at the mirror she saw her father.

"James where did you find a picture of my father?"

"I didn't. It's a necklace of erised. It shows you what you want most in the world. In your case it seams to be to have your dad alive." Lily was on the verge of tears.

"Thank you so much." James laughed.

"You're welcome! And you don't need to cry about it!" He gave her a sweet smile.

"Cool! I want to see in it!" Lily handed the necklace to Sirius. "Wow! I see a flying motorcycle! I wonder if I'll ever get one?" Remus took it out of his hands and looked into it. He didn't say what he saw, just nodded. Lily had a feeling that it had something to do with him not being a werewolf any longer. He passed it onto Peter, who said that when he looked into it he saw himself buried in city. Peter finally handed the locket to James, who looked into it, blushed, and handed it back to Lily.

"Well?"

"Well what?"

"What did you see James?"

"Um well, I um I saw, well um it was…"

"Yes?" He lowered his head, his face as red as the fire.

"I saw a picture of me and Lily." Sirius and Remus doubled over in laughter, Peter looked strangely at him and Lily turned as red as James.

"I knew it!" Sirius said in-between laughs. "You love Lily!"

"I…I…"

"You love Lily, James! Admit it!"

"I…I…"

"Lily and James, sitting in a tree, k-i-s-s-i-n-g!"

"Alright! I DO OK!" Remus, Sirius and Peter started laughing again.

"You do James?" Lily said, grinning slightly.

"Well, yeah I guess I do." James brought his face back up. Now it wasn't red, it was smiling.

Happy New Years!

The days passed quickly and it was getting closer and closer to the New Year. Three days after Christmas Sirius got the same letter as Lily, James and Remus. Only for him, it did not have a bottom part. Instead it said,

The book will let me win, Sirius. Give me the book, Sirius. You can be on my side and be powerful too, Sirius. Join my side, Sirius.

Sirius had rushed right to Dumbeldore and given him the letter. Lily was close enough that she could hear some of the conversation.

"Sirius, this is very serious. Whatever you do, do not…." And that was all Lily could hear, for at that moment, Severus Snape walked over to the table.

"So, Lily, I heard you and James kissed. Is that true?"

"It's none of your business, Severus."

"Oh I think it is."

"Well I don't." Remus replied.

"Stay out of this Remus, this is not your problem."

"If it's Lily's problem, it's our problem." James said, staring Severus straight in the eye.

"Meah!" Peter exclaimed, his mouth full of food.

"So where's that Sirius to protect you, huh Lily? They can't all stop me from doing something to you. But if Sirius was here they could. But he isn't here, is he?"

"Yes he is." Sirius tapped Severus on the shoulder.

"Excuse me Severus but I believe you have a little something on your face." Remus handed Severus a mirror. Severus looked in it and shrieked. He had big pink blush circles on his cheeks, bright red lipstick and blue eye shadow on.

"Take it off right now!"

"Sorry, I can't."

"What do you mean you can't?"

"Well I learned the curse, but not the counter curse. You're going to have to get a teacher to fix that for you."

"You were saying, Severus?" Lily exclaimed rather coldly. He glared at her and headed straight to the teacher's table. This time Lily could not hear what they were saying, but she saw Severus talking to Dumbeldore and pointing toward them. She saw a glint of amusement and laughter in his eyes while looking at Severus. Lily couldn't blame him. He did look very funny.

"What did he say Sirius?"

"He said that whatever I do, do not join forces with you-know-who." Lily put down the fork she had been holding.

"You won't, will you Sirius?" There was a silence, and then Sirius started laughing.

"Of course not Lil'! He's the last one I would join with."

"Good. I'm glad."

~

Sirius started acting very strangely. He would snap at people and when he talked about you-know-who, he said Voldemort. And that was the other thing, he was always talking about Voldemort.

Before Lily knew it, it was December 31^st. There was going to be a huge party in the great hall that night and Lily, Remus, Sirius, James and Peter couldn't wait.

"They said that they would have every kind of candy you can think of there!"

"And just think about the confetti and ribbons when the clock strikes twelve!"

"Confetti and ribbons are nice, but candy is much better."

"What are you looking forward to Sirius?"

"I think it's a dumb idea, ok Remus? I wouldn't even go if I didn't have to."

"Sorry." Sirius scowled at him and headed up to the boy's dormitory.

"Is and just me or is something….different about him recently?"

"It's not just you, Lil'. I noticed it too. Sirius doesn't usually act this…well….mean."

"Sirius never acts like this. Either something very wrong is going on in his life or somebody took control of him or something like that. But he isn't doing this on his own free will. I'm almost positive about that."

"I think you're right Remus."

~

The party was turning out to be wonderful. Everyone except for Sirius and some of the Slytheriens were having a great time.

"Children! One minute until the New Year! Lets all start counting!" Sirius left the group and ran over to the entrance of the great hall and poked his head out. When he brought his head back out Lily saw the first smile on him that she had in days. But it wasn't the right kind of smile. It was almost an evil smile.

"10, 9, 8, 7," Lily was starting to get the feeling that something wasn't right.

"6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1!" But before anyone could shout, Happy New Year, Voldemort came barging in through the entrance.

~

James's first intention was to run and grab Sirius. But he stopped himself. Voldemort was actually talking to Sirius and pointing toward a group of scared looking Huffelpuffs. Sirius nodded and started toward them, wand raised and grinning wickedly. James suddenly knew why Sirius had been acting so strangely. He took one last look at his friends and ran to him.

"Sirius what are you doing?"

"Go away James!"

"Sirius you can't do this! Don't let him take over your life!"

"I said go away James!"

"No!" Sirius pointed his wand to James and started to say a few words, but stopped. His eyes softened a bit, but hardened immediately again. Sirius grabbed him by the shoulders and marched him straight over to Voldemort. James's stomach was in a tight knot.

"Master, he is one of the ones you sent me to find."

"Good. Do you have the book boy?" James realized that Voldemort was now talking to him. He shook his head.

"Well then who does?"

"I won't tell you."

"Tell me!"

"No! I won't!" Voldemort stared at him.

"Fine. I'll just have to get the answer out of you the hard way. Sirius, take him to my home. I will get the rest myself."

"Yes master. Perhaps a bit more strength, master? He is very strong."
"Very well." Voldemort tapped his wand on Sirius shoulder. His grip tightened. James knew he should yell for Lily and Remus to run, but when he tried, nothing came out of his mouth. James saw Voldemort advancing on the two huddled in a corner, and then saw darkness.

~

When he finally awoke, he was in a small dark cell, but he was not alone. Lily and Remus were in it also. Outside of the cell was Sirius, asleep. James couldn't remember almost anything about what had happened. He remembered New Years, and Sirius talking to Voldemort, and Voldemort heading toward Lily and Remus, but that was all.

"Lily? Remus?" Lily shifted a bit, but did not say anything. Remus on the other hand opened his eyes.

"James? Where are we? Why are we here?" His focus was suddenly on Sirius, because of a loud snore. "Why is Sirius sleeping outside our…this…thing?"

"I'm…I'm not sure Remus. I just woke up and I can't remember much of anything."

"Is Peter here too?"

"I don't see him." Sirius suddenly shifted and awoke.

"Sirius! Thank goodness you're awake! Get us out of here!" Sirius glared at Remus.

"Why would I get you out of your cell? I was the one who put you in it…werewolf. Hey maybe when you transform in there you can eat Lily and James for me." Remus looked hurt.

"I…I try not to eat anything when I…I change but…but sometimes I can't help it…it…it just happens."

"Sure, whatever you say, werewolf. Now we just need to wait until Lily is up and then we can start."

"Start what?"

"I'm not telling you." He smirked. Lily shifted again, and this time opened her eyes slightly. "Oh well then I guess we can start right now. Fear! They're awake!" Sirius called.

"Fear?" Sirius smirked again and quickly left the room.

"James? Remus? What's going on?"

"I'm not sure." The room was silent. Suddenly, James heard a low growl coming from a separate door. A cage door, really. It swung open and out stepped a griffin.

~

"Did you call Fear?"

"Yes master."

"Good job, Sirius. You will be very powerful because of your decisions when you grow older. However, you will need to be trained by a boy who has more knowledge on the subject. Peter, come in here!" Peter's pudgy round head poked into the room followed by his body.

"Peter?"

"Sirius?"

"You know each other?"

"Yes master. We go to school together."

"I see. Now Peter I want you to teach Sirius our ways."

"Yes master. And if he shows any signs of changing back to…good?"

"Then bring him to me."

~

Remus stared at the griffin in shock. He was almost certain that it was the same on that he had seen at the Quidditch match. There was a kind of intelligence in its eyes that you don't see in that of a lion or eagle. It walked closer to the cell and peered right at Lily. She started to shake.

"I see that you have the dark power." James, Remus and Lily jumped. Hearing the animal talk was a bit unexpected. "If you use that power the right way Lily you can become very powerful. Very powerful indeed."

"How…how do you know my name?"

"I know things, Lily. I know many things. And one of the things that I know is that you should join us. We could use your power." Remus noticed Lily was looking weaker. Like she was about to give in. And then he understood.

"Join us Lily. Put your power to use."

"I…I…"

"Don't listen to him Lil'!" Remus suddenly shouted. "Cover your ears!"

"Remus, what…?"

"The letter! It said to not listen to Fear! He's fear!" Lily looked very confused. And all of a sudden her eyes brightened and she put her hands on her ears. James and Remus followed. The griffin stared at them.

"Very well. I see you are too smart for me to entice you. But I almost had Lily. Now, back to the point. Lily, give me the book." Lily lowered her hands cautiously.

~ (A/N now we are changing to Lily's point of view)

"What book?"

"What book? The book. The book of Darkness. The one that only you can touch."

"I…I won't give it to you."

"Oh but you must." The griffin's ebony eyes were drilling into hers. She was becoming weak again.

"I…I must?"

"Yes, Lily. You must give me the book." In a complete trance, Lily reached a hand into her Hogwarts robe pocket and brought out the book. She started to hand it to the griffin when James snatched it out of her hands.

"Lily, you can't give him the book!"

"I can't?"

"But you must!"

"I must?" Lily looked very confused.

"Lily you won't give the book to him!" Suddenly, everything was clear.

"I won't." It was no longer a wondering, but a firm answer. Whatever happens, do not give him the book, Lily. She thought to herself. And she knew that no matter what happened, she wouldn't. Once again, Lily did one of those things where she would never know why she did it. She just…did. She said an unlocking spell and opened the door to her cell and stepped out. Without even being told James and Remus followed. Fear was so surprised that he didn't even think about going after them until they had ran out of the room.

~

There were so many corridors that James knew he couldn't memorize it even if he tried. They were always taking the closet hallway, never turning around to see if maybe Fear was following. All James knew was that he ran and ran until he ran right into a room with Sirius in it, by himself. They all stopped abruptly. Sirius jumped up from the chair he had been sitting in.

"How did you get out? Why hasn't Fear eaten you?" He relaxed a bit. "No matter. I'll just have to take you to master. He can take care of you." Sirius waved his wand, and suddenly Lily, James and Remus were floating toward another room. "Cool trick, huh? My trainer taught it to me. I was waiting for him to come back with a book of dark spells but then you came along." Finally they reached the small room and Sirius shoved them inside.

"Master, they found a way out of their cells."

"Take the two boys, whatever their names are, and practice some of your spells on them. Leave the girl to me." Sirius nodded and pointed his wand at James and Remus, who started floating back down the hall.

~

"So, Lily. You have something I want I believe."

"If you're talking about the book, you can't have it."

"I believe I can." Voldemort waved his wand simply and the book floated out of Lily's robes and right into his hits. "You know why you can touch the book don't you? Dumbeldore didn't just tell you it was because you had special powers did he?" Lily, confused, nodded. "It's a lie. You're evil Lily. You can touch the book because you're evil." He was leaning toward her, trying to frighten her. Yet Lily wasn't afraid.

"I'm not evil. I know I'm not evil."

"Oh but you are Lily."

"No I'm not." She said it firmly but in her mind the opinion was faltering.

"Lily you are one of the most evil people in the wizards world. Only the evilest people can touch the book. And you can touch the book, can't you?"

"I'm not evil!"

~

"Hmm…what spell should I do on you first?" James and Remus were chained to the wall, back in the room that they had first entered. Sirius was pacing in front of them menacingly. "You know, I don't really think that I know a spell to do enough damage to kill you." A wide grin swept across his face. "So I'll just have to learn one. Excuse me gentlemen, I must find my trainer." He quickly left the room, still grinning.

"There's has to be a way to make him good again!"

"But there's not James. Once you've gone over to the dark arts it's impossible to come back."

"But…but it can't be!" If one looked very hard, they could have seen a light bulb turn on over James's head. "I know! The letters! They said to save the innocent… and Sirius is the innocent! We just have to do what the letter says!"

"Lily doesn't know though! And we don't have anyway of telling her!"

"Well we can at least do our part, Remus."

~

Voldemort stared at her. His eyes had an uncanny resemblance to those of Fear. There was power in them. Lily tried to look away, but her head barely moved. Thoughts, horrible thoughts started pouring into her head. The dark is good. The dark arts are wonderful. I should join the dark arts. "No, I won't! I won't!" She was struggling against the power, trying to free herself. But it was no use. Lily was about to admit defeat when she had an idea. To save the innocent, fear only fear itself. To save the innocent… Sirius! Lily tried harder than she ever had before to not be afraid. She thought about funny things. And she thought about James, and Sirius, and Remus and even Peter. She thought as hard as she could about Dumbeldore and Hogwarts and her parents. But most of all, she thought about being brave. The eyes were starting to lose their power. They knew that Lily was starting to beat them.

~

"Peter! Peter!" Suddenly Sirius stopped abruptly and looked around. He had no idea where he was, or why he was calling out for Peter. He spun around wearily. Sirius could hear a low murmuring coming from one of the passageways on the left. He crept to it and poked his head around the corner. Seeing no one he stepped into the hall. The voices were coming from a room at the end of it.

He approached the room cautiously, unsure of who or what might be inside.

"Keep trying to think about the letter. It still may not be to late to save him."

"How can I think about the note when I know in just a few minutes he'll be back in here with a spell that will kill us! And I just can't bare to have my best friend kill us!" It took awhile for the voices to register themselves in Sirius's head. When he finally realized that it was James and Remus the first thought that came to his head was, their best friend's going to kill them? I thought I was their best friend! Sirius suddenly realized how foolish it was to be standing in a corridor in a strange place by himself when his two best friends were in the room right in front of him. He stepped in.

James and Remus stared at him gloomily. Sirius was very confused.

"Well I finally get to see my two best friends and they don't even say hello!"

"We're not your best friends."

"You're not?"

"Well we thought we were. But then you changed."

"I changed?"

"Yes you changed, Sirius. Don't act so stupid. You know very well that you joined Voldemort!" James lowered his head in despair. Sirius was shocked. He could barely talk.

"I…never…how could…could you say that I…I did something like…like that!" James raised his head. There was a glint of hope in his eye.

"Remus I think we did it!"

"How can we be sure?"

"I know. Sirius, the keys to these handcuffs are on that table. Let us go!" Sirius hurriedly grabbed the keys and freed his friends.

"Yep! He's back!" Remus and James pulled Sirius into a big bear hug, knocking the wind out of him. Remus suddenly pulled away.

"I'm just as happy as you guys are about Sirius being back, but I believe Lily needs some help."

"I believe your right. You know, we're probably all going to die."

"Most likely." But Remus's voice didn't sound scared. It sounded cool and relaxed.

"Let's go find Lily."

~

She was winning again. The eyes were growing weaker. It reminded Lily of a staring contest. She knew that if she closed her eyes, she would lose her concentration and then he would win. Voldemort suddenly stopped and sat straight up.
"Why am I wasting my time with you? You won't come to my side. That is obvious. But things that don't come to my side," he whipped out his wand, "are destroyed. Goodbye, Lily."

"No!" Lily whipped around and saw what she thought would be her last look at James, Sirius and Remus. Because right afterward, that horrible darkness took over again.

~

Lily's body hit the hard cold ground with a sickening crunch. Voldemort was laughing shrilly. Sirius, Remus and James looked at the body in horror. Sirius was the first to move. He ran over to the body and picked up her wrist. He put his fingers on her wrist where her pulse would be. Sirius's face went a deadly white. He looked to James and Remus, tears in his eyes, and shook his head. James and Remus were both wandless. Only Sirius had his wand.

~

James didn't know what to do. He didn't have his wand and he, an eleven year old boy, not even finished with his first year of Hogwarts, and two other boys, who had as little schooling as he and only one with a wand, standing in front of the darkest, evilest wizard of all time. And in his hands, was the book that would make him invincible. Things were not looking good. Remus muttered the words to a body bind spell, but Voldemort just laughed.

"You really think something like that could hurt me?" He was doubled over in an unpleasant laughter. James got an idea.

"Hexaholra!" He shouted.

"Hexaholra!" Sirius said in reply.

"Hexaholra!" Remus shouted it also, ending the spell. The floor began to shake and the walls began to crumble. The floor was shaking so bad that the book dropped right out of Voldemort's grasp, straight into the dead Lily's hand. Sirius, being the closest one to Lily, closed Lily's hand around the book, it, while she was still holding it, grabbed Lily's body. Remus and James helped pick her up.

"We have to get out of here fast!" Suddenly, Peter's pudgy face came into the doorway.

"Sirius! Remus! James! Thank goodness! I was so worried! I was a prisoner too but I broke the locks it…"

"Tell us about it later, Peter! We need to run!" And they ran alright. They ran so fast that even after they got to the door they couldn't stop themselves. They were now inside the Forbidden Forest. They ran on the path, not daring to look back to see whether Voldemort or something else was following. It was James who first collapsed. Sirius and Lily followed, then Peter and finally Remus. Whether it was from being so tired, or perhaps something in Voldemort's home, they never knew. All they knew was that it never felt so good to lie down.

Saving the Innocent

"Where did you find them, Hagrid?"

"Inside the Forbidden Forest, sir. They was surrounded by some centaurs. I think that they's was about to kill 'em. But when they saw me and realized that I knew 'em they stopped right away."

"I'm glad you found them."

"I am too, sir. But there's more. Lily, sir. I…I don't think that she's…well…alive."

Silence.

"Let me have a look at her." There was suddenly more light on the inside of James's eyelid. He tried to open his eyes, but he was exhausted. And he knew he was still inside Voldemort's home and he didn't want to see it anymore. Open your eyes James! A harsh voice inside his head told him, so he did. When he looked around he didn't see Voldemort's home; he saw the school infirmary. He sat straight up, making the school nurse, Professor Dumbeldore and Hagrid jump.

"James! I'm glad you're awake, but please lay back down!" James was thinking about what they had said. It was all starting to make sense.

"But Lily! You said Lily's…Lily's…"

"We're not sure about that yet, Mr. Potter. Please lay back down and I will tell you after I know." James reluctantly put his head back on the pillow. He heard the shuffling of feet and then Dumbeldore breathing heavily.

"Hagrid I…I have to say you're right. Lily's dead." It took awhile for James to believe it that Lily was dead. When he finally did realize it though he began to cry.

~

Remus and Sirius didn't wake up until two days after James. Peter didn't wake up for a very long time. He was partly glad when they did, and partly upset. He was glad he had someone to talk to, but he wasn't sure if he wanted to talk. Lily's body still hadn't been removed from the infirmary, on James's request. He wanted to see her one more time when he could get up. And he was sure that Sirius and Remus and Peter would feel the same way.

"James? What's going on?" Sirius was the first one to wake up, and he looked very confused. James never answered the question.

"It's all my fault. If only I had gotten there earlier.

"All your fault? What's all your fault? What are you talking about?"

"Lily's dead." He heard nothing from Sirius's bed.

"She's…she's dead?" Now Remus was speaking. He had obviously woken up and had been listening to the conversation.

"Yes. She's dead. See for yourself, she's lying right next to you." He heard bed springs moving, which was most likely Remus rolling over in his bed.

"She's dead!" James was sitting up and he saw both Sirius and Remus try too also. They finally managed it and Sirius turned his head slightly in Lily's direction. But he didn't look like he could go all the way. Instead he flung his legs bravely over the bed and took shaky steps to Lily's bed. Remus and James followed, Peter tossing in the bed behind them. They all walked to Remus's bed and sat down, since he was very close to Lily. They stared at the body silently.

"I have a crazy idea." Remus whispered.

"What?"

"You know how we saved Sirius? Well maybe we can save Lily too."

"But she's dead."

"I know. But she died innocent. And it said to save the innocent. We can at least try it. Sirius should take over Lily's part, to not be afraid of Voldemort." Sirius gulped and nodded. The room went into an eerie silence; every boy concentrating so hard that nothing else could come into their mind. Sirius was the first one to notice it.

"Her eyelids!"

"What about them?"

"They fluttered!" Everyone was silent, holding their breath. The eyelids fluttered again.

"Keep thinking about the letter!" Lily's hand twitched a bit. Remus grabbed it and felt her pulse. And smiled.

"She's alive! We did it!" A small groan and squeak came out of her. And then she rolled over so that she was facing them, and opened her eyes. They all cheered.

"I had the weirdest dream." She croaked, smiling. "I was up in heaven for the whole dream." Sirius, Remus, and James smiled slightly at each other; each knowing that it was not a dream. But they wouldn't tell Lily that for awhile.

"Professor Dumbeldore! Mrs. White!" The nurse and the Professor came rushing in.

"What is it? What's wrong? Why did you…" Mrs. White took one look at Lily and screamed. "She's alive! How did you…when did you…how?" Dumbeldore looked surprised.

"I'm alive? What do you mean? I've always been alive!"

"I'm afraid not Lily dear. Voldemort killed you but somehow these three found a wave to save you. Good job boys! How are you feeling Lily?"

"So my dream…?" Each boy nodded. "Oh I'm feeling ok. Just now a little dizzy."

"Good. I'm glad you're alive. Now you need some rest."

"Wait. How long have I been asleep?"

"About three days."

"THREE DAYS!"

"It's ok Lil'. Peter's still asleep." They all laughed, and then clutched their sides in pain.

"Hmm…well I think I'll leave you to catch up on what happened."

"Wait! Professor Dumbeldore, I still have the book."

"Good job Lily. When you can walk please put it back into the restricted section of the library. Here, I will write you a pass. If I could touch the book I would do it myself."

"One last thing. You-know-who…"

"Just say Voldemort."

"Ok, Voldemort, said that the reason I could touch the book is because I'm evil, not because I have special powers. Is that," she gulped, "true?"

"Partly yes and partly no. You could become evil. Some of the powers in you are indeed evil, but that doesn't make you evil."

"Oh." She nodded certainly, but still looked confused.

"Now I have some things to do. I beg you all to sleep, you need it. Goodnight."

"Goodnight."

The school nurse wouldn't let them leave their beds for a week. She kept insisting that they weren't well enough to walk. Finally she let Lily get up to return the book to the restricted section of the library and Peter, Sirius, James and Remus followed. They never went back to the infirmary, even after the book was delivered.

~

It was exactly two days after they had gotten up and James was searching for Dumbeldore. He finally found him heading toward the teacher's lounge.

"Professor Dumbeldore! I was just wondering if maybe you could help me?"

"With what?"

"Well sir I'm still confused about what happened that night. I was hoping maybe you could help me figure some of it out."

"Of course James. What is confusing you?"

"Well why is it that Voldemort sent us those letters saying how to bring Lily back to life and save Sirius from being dark?"

"The challenge."

"Excuse me?"

"He wanted the challenge. I have to say that I…knew him when he was younger. He always loved being challenged. He gave you the letter so that you would figure it out and things would become more interesting than him simply taking the book from Lily."

"Oh. And why did Sirius join him in the first place?"
"Most likely the letter had a curse on it. There are certain curses where the first person to touch a certain object will be under your control."

"Right. And well, why did those certain things help us save Sirius and Lily?"

"Because those were the things you needed to work on in your life. Before you met Lily you weren't a very compassionate person I suppose?"

"No sir."

"And then you met her and began to believe in love. Remus needed to stop being ashamed of being a werewolf…yes I know that he's a werewolf James. And Lily needed to stop being afraid of things."

"I think I understand now. Thank you Professor Dumbeldore."

"Anytime James. Oh and James, do try to stay out of trouble from now on." He said it seriously, but he was smiling. James smiled back.

The End A/N keep reading this is just the chapter name =)

The rest of the school year went by so quickly that Lily couldn't believe it when she was boarding the train to leave Hogwarts. It had definitely been a strange year. The whole school heard about the whole adventure and everyone was admiring them even more. (Except for the Slytheriens, who were hating them more than ever.)

~

And even though Severus was making Lilly's life miserable, her father and only girl friend had died, Voldemort was after her to get a book that would make him invincible, and one of her best friends was a werewolf she was much happier at Hogwarts than she had ever been before.

~

And even though he was a werewolf, his parents were dead one of his best friends had died, come back to life, one of his other friends had joined Voldemort and his biggest Slytherien enemy was making his life miserable, Remus was much happier at Hogwarts than he had ever been before.

~

And even though his friends didn't like him much, his parents were dead, he had another boy making his life miserable and he was following the dark lord, Peter was much happier at Hogwarts than he had ever been before.

~

And even though he had joined the dark side, only to be saved by his friends, had seen one of his best friends die and be brought back to life, and one of his best friends was a werewolf and Voldemort was now after him to make him come back to the dark side Sirius was much happier at Hogwarts than he had ever been before.

~

And even though James had seen his girlfriend die right in front of his eyes, seen his best friend try to murder some innocent people, was hated by every Slytherien in Hogwarts, and had Voldemort searching for him, James was much happier at Hogwarts than he had ever been before.

~

A/N Ok, I think I owe a few explanations. First of all, I know that first years don't go to Hogsmeade, but something might just happen in upcoming books that changes that =). Also I know that they didn't have a friend named Crystal, but I thought it would be fun to add her in. And please don't flame me about making a necklace of erised, I was stuck on what I wanted James to get her and that was the first thing that came to my strange mind. Also, I know that there is no such thing as October break. But I was stuck again J Anyway, please review my story with any questions and I will do my best to answer them. Thanks! =)

Disclaimer: Lily, James, Sirius, Remus, Peter, Hagrid, Fang, Professor Dumbeldore, Professor McGongall, Severus, Sir Nicholas De Mimsy Porpington, Petunia and Voldemort belong to J.K. Rowling. Crystal, Professor Black, Mrs. White and Professor Callahan belong to me.