James Potter strode confidently into the library of Hogwarts, ignoring all the stunned faces around him. Indeed, James had managed to avoid this god-forsaken place for the three years that he had been at the school. He looked around, searching for his friend's face. Instead, his eyes caught the gleam of familiar red hair, and James approached the girl bent over her book

"Evans!" He called quietly. The girl lifted her eyes to James, sighed, then resumed reading

"Really James, I thought this was the one place I was safe from you."

"I'm not here about our fight, I'm looking for Remus."

"Isn't he supposed to be visiting his mum?"

"Well yeah but he should be back already."

"I don't know, James." Lily answered, exasperated. There was a short silence before James asked :

"What are you reading?"

"Why do you care?" She responded, but there was no reply, so she continued " it's about magical beasts... like werewolves and such."

"Is it interesting?

Lily sighed before answering. "Yes, very, but I don't expect you to read it, so I'd like you to leave please."

Before James could respond, he heard someone call his name loudly, and turned to see Peter and Sirius running towards him, causing quite a flourish of angry looks thrown at them. As the drew near, the panic in their eyes became obvious.

"What's the matter?" James asked immediately

"It's... Remus..." Peter reported, hands on his knees and panting heavily.

"He's in the hospital wing." continued Sirius " Pete saw Madam Pomfrey almost carrying him, it seems really bad."

Sirius had hardly finished his sentence as both James and Lily stood so violently that their chairs clattered against the floor, causing more annoyed hisses, but the group were already hurrying away. It took them only a few minutes to reach the double doors that lead toto the hospital wing, which they burst into. Madam Pomfrey, the school nurse, emerged from behind a set of white curtains and scuttled towards them.

"You can't see him." She announced, but James had seen the blood on her fingers and gown.

"Is that Remus's ?" He blemished.

"Uh... well yes."

"What happened?" Sirius demanded.

"Nothing to worry about, he'll be - ""

"What happened?" Lily repeated, shaking all over.

"He tripped and fell - uh - quite a bit into a ditch full of thorns among other things, but he'll be fine by tomorrow ."

The group relaxed a bit.

"Can't we see him?" Peter asked.

"No, he's sleeping for now, you'll see him tomorrow." She answered in a definitive voice.

"Ok... we'll go... thank you miss." Said James quietly, then the group left.

Remus woke several hours later, to the sound of curtains being violently opened.

"Really James, you could make an effort!" he heard, but could not see the source of the voice.

"Lily? James, is that you?" Four dark shapes appeared next to the bed.

"We're all here, mate. Lumos." and he could suddenly see Sirius, James, Peter and Lily standing over him, smiling softly. Remus pulled the quilt up higher to try and conceal his most severe cuts.

"How are you feeling?" Asked Lily, who sat down next to the patient and started clearing the hair from his face.

"I'm fine," he assured them "just fell off my broom on the way back is all."

"Fell - Madam Pomfrey told us you tripped and landed in a ditch!" Exclaimed Sirius.

"Oh - um - yeah well I fell off my broom and tripped while I was trying to find it." he explained rapidly, cold sweats rushing over him. "Anyway, I'm fine, that's most important, right? You can go back to bed."

"Yeah, well we just wanted to see how you were doing ... OK, we'll let you sleep now...see you." Said James awkwardly.

Once they had left the room, Sirius burst out :

"What the hell, James! We were in there barely a minute!"

"Shut up, you'll wake the whole school up! He clearly didn't want us there... I think something fishy is going on."

"Why?" Asked Lily

"D'you see how he reacted when Sirius told him that Pomfrey's story wasn't the same as his?... I think he's lying to us... falling into a ditch doesn't make cuts like that."

"Why would he lie?"

"I don't know but I'm going to find out. I swear if anyone did this to him I'll hex them so hard their parents won't recognise them!"

They had reached the Griffindor commonroom and Lily left the boys to go back to her dorm. The boys said nothing as they undressed and got into bed.