I'll Wait For You

By Hazelmist

Summary: This is a sequel/spin off of my Lily and James story I'll Fight For You but it's going to focus more on Grace Adams and her relationship with Sirius Black. I highly recommend you read I'll Fight For You first or you'll be very confused. If you want a summary, look at the top of the prologue chapter. In the prologue we see two very different first encounters between Grace and Sirius and Grace and Evan Wilkes in Diagon Alley before they start their first year (as well as glimpses of the Adams, Lily and James). Grace and James upset a shopkeeper, get separated and Grace gets dragged off by Evan Wilkes to Knockturn Alley. He corners her and tells her that her mother murdered his and put his father in Azkaban and that he's going to make her pay for that, but Sirius arrives in time to rescue her and bring her back to Diagon Alley to her family. Grace asks her father if it's true and he says it's not but the chapter ends with Evan Wilkes receiving the news that his father has been executed in Azkaban and him vowing revenge. The previous chapter ups the timeline to the winter holidays in the Seventh and final year at Hogwarts, six years after the events in the prologue and one year after the showdown in I'll Fight For You. The previous chapter shows Grace hiding something from her family and friends, going to a NYE party with her friends in muggle London and meeting a handsome muggle. The previous chapter ended and began with Evan Wilkes POV this one begins and ends with Evans POV as well.

Disclaimer: Everything belongs to J.K. Rowling except for maybe Gracie, Mary, Oliver and Ophelia.

A/N: Sorry I'm kind of out of practice writing, but this has been done for months it just needed to be finished so I'm updating! The next chapter is done as well so please review and I'll post it soon!


Chapter Two: The Warning

He never brought her home. He abandoned her in an alleyway near a rarely used entrance to the Ministry of Magic with his signature scrawled across her bare chest. Stepping back, he took the time to admire his spellwork. In time the enchantments would wear off, but for now it looked almost like Grace Adams had finally gone to her eternal rest.

"Sweet dreams," he murmured, bending to kiss the raven haired girl's head. A ragged breath escaped the girl's bloody lips, warming his cheeks. It was hard to believe that she had survived all of that, but those stupid Gryffindors always fought to the death.

He snapped her neck. She stilled. He grinned as he stepped away from the lifeless girl.

"Good night, Gracie."


She drifted in and out of consciousness. It was cold and the rough coat that she clung to smelt strange and unfamiliar. His hands were freezing and just a little too tight, but they were all that were holding her together. She let him carry her, keeping her eyes clamped shut against the world that wouldn't stop spinning. Even when they came to a halt, the spins continued.

"You got her?" a breathless voice asked.

"Yeah, she passed out as soon as I caught up to her," her stranger answered.

"I can take her from here," the other voice snapped. She felt the freezing hands relinquish their stiff hold on her, and a pair of warm hands replaced them as she was shifted from one pair of arms to another.

"I think she should stay here until she sobers up," the stranger said.

"No, I think you've done more than enough," the other practically snarled. "I'm taking her home."

She opened her eyes for just a moment, looking up into his face. When she recognized him, she sighed and buried her face into his cloak. It smelt like home.


The next morning Grace woke with an unpleasant pounding in her head and Sirius Black in her face. She didn't remember much of what had happened last night but she remembered enough of it to know that she had drank way too much.

"Ugh, go away!" she moaned, pulling the covers over her head. She felt awful and she probably looked it too. It wasn't that she was vain or anything, or that she minded waking up to such a handsome view, but she was almost positive that she was going to hurl if she tried to lift her head again.

"Come on, Gracie. You'll feel much better once you take this, trust me," Sirius chuckled, gently prying the blanket from her fingers. Grace groaned as he helped her to sit up, refusing to open her eyes because she didn't want to see how amusing he was finding her predicament.

"Here," he said, cupping one of her hands around a cold glass. "Drink this."

Grace had the glass halfway to her lips before she caught a whiff of it and immediately stopped. She cracked open one eye and growled, "Sirius Black if you put dragon dung in this I swear to Merlin's baggy y fronts that I will kill you."

"Grace Adams, you wound me. I'm appalled that you think I am capable of such mischief!"

Grace opened her other eye and glared at him.

"In my defense I never told you to drink James's coffee," Sirius said, lifting his hands defensively.

"Yeah, but you didn't exactly tell me NOT to drink it either," Grace grumbled, recalling the day two years ago when Sirius had laced James's coffee. To this day neither James nor Grace could tolerate the drink.

"It doesn't have dragon dung in it, I swear, and it'll make your hangover go away instantly. But if you want to spend the next six hours throwing up every twenty minutes –" Sirius made to take the glass away but Grace turned her body away from him and with a wrinkle of her nose she tipped back her head and forced it down her throat.

"That was disgusting," she said, making a face as she handed the empty glass back to him.

"Well, it did contain dragon sperm –"

"Dragon WHAT?" Grace's hand flew to her lips.

"Feel better?" Sirius inquired innocently.

Grace realized with a shock that she did feel better, loads better. Sirius laughed but got up from the bed and out of reach, just in case she did decide to punch him.

"I'm going to pretend that that was a joke," Grace said generously.

"Good, because I would hate to have you trying to beat the shit out of me the WHOLE way to St. Mungo's."

"What?" Grace threw off the covers and looked as if she were reconsidering her decision not to punch him. Somehow it always seemed like Sirius was the bearer of bad news and he always paid dearly for it.

"You've got an appointment at St. Mungos in two hours," Sirius informed her, keeping one hand on the doorknob. "They owled Heather and Danny this morning. Just a check up I think…"

Grace swore and aimed a kick at the bedside table. Sirius winced as one of the framed photographs balanced on the tabletop fell and shattered. Against his better judgment, he left the safety of the doorway and retrieved it from the floor.

"Why can't they just leave me alone?" Grace groaned, flopping back down on her bed. "I'm fine now! Bringing me in is only going to make me physically ill and more miserable. I hate St. Mungos. I hate all of this."

"I know," Sirius said quietly, looking down at the photograph in his hand. He tried to think of something to say to lighten the situation, but all of the humor was sucked right out of him at the sight of her family waving back at him. There was Mark and little Christopher with his mischievous grin and Hope before her memories were shattered. But what really killed him was seeing how carelessly happy and bright and childish Gracie looked in the photograph, standing between her living and breathing parents with her arms wrapped around her baby brother. Sirius swallowed hard and tapped his wand to the frame, repairing the shattered glass before replacing it on the bedside table. He wished it would be that easy to fix Gracie, because dense as he sometimes was, he knew that there was more than just grief plaguing her. Something wasn't right but Sirius couldn't understand it.

"Thanks," Grace said and he looked up to find her staring at the photograph.

"I miss them too, you know," he said carefully, though he didn't know if it was the right thing to say.

Grace nodded as if she already knew this and stretched out a hand to touch the frame. She traced the edge as if she were getting rid of the dust, but it had been handled so often that Sirius knew that there was none. Suddenly her hand stilled, her whole body freezing up.

"Sirius?" she whispered, deliberately avoiding his eyes. "What happened last night?"

"You got completely sloshed," he chuckled.

"I know that," she said, rolling her eyes. "But did I do anything or say anything… odd?" she asked tentatively, staring hard at the photograph.

Sirius rubbed the back of his neck, because though he remembered a hell of a lot more than Gracie did, the details were fuzzy but from what he did recall… There had been something really important, but that was where everything got a little cloudy. Grace had been trying to tell him something but then she'd taken off and after that everyone had been out searching for her until that dumb muggle bloke finally caught up with her in the street and brought her back safely. Sirius wished he could remember what it was that was clearly bothering Gracie but he couldn't.

"Well, first, I saved you from some muggle ogre, and then you told me you thought I was hot and gorgeous, and I think at one point we shagged and it was awesome –"

Grace punched his arm but she was grinning and therefore he was grinning. It was addicting.

"For a Marauder, you're a lousy liar," she laughed.

"What gave me away?" he asked, pretending to be stumped.

"You called Oliver an ogre and I'm pretty sure you would've had a black eye and been missing a limb if you had even attempted to have sex with me," she said, hitting him with her pillow. Sirius leapt to his feet.

"He was freakishly tall!" he retorted as he moved out of range.

"But also freakishly good looking!" Grace added, brandishing her pillow as she shooed him toward the door.

"And we could have shagged, you'll never know…" he said, wiggling his eyebrows suggestively.

"Oh, trust me, I'd know!" Grace smacked him with the pillow again and Sirius retreated behind the door.

"You never denied admitting that I'm gorgeous!" he sing songed through the crack. The door slammed so hard in his face that it almost caught his nose. "Be ready in an hour, love!" he laughed, and then whistling he went on his way. Grace leaned against the doorframe, listening as his annoying tune faded away and then she took a running leap and threw herself face down on the bed.

What the hell was wrong with her? She almost blew it. Closing her eyes, she made a vow to herself never to get drunk with Sirius Black ever again. It was too dangerous.


Grace Adams opened her eyes and stared up at the unfamiliar ceiling. She lay on her back with her hands tucked behind her head. She kept crossing and uncrossing her ankles, shifting for a more comfortable position on the hard hospital bed in St. Mungo's, but the nervous jitters in her stomach would not go away. Why hadn't the healers come back yet? It had to have been more than an hour.

"Stop doing that," a voice chided her, from the bedside. "You're making me nervous."

Grace kicked out blindly in the general direction of the voice. She smirked as her toe connected with bone, eliciting a muffled curse from the figure slumped in the armchair.

"That's it, I can't take this anymore," he sighed. She heard the chair legs scrape across the floor and the squeak of the bed springs as the mattress sunk inward.

Grace tried to roll off the bed, but the boy was too quick for her. In one fluid movement, he was on the bed with her and had one strong arm thrown across her, imprisoning both her arms. Grace caught her breath as he rearranged himself around her so that he wasn't hurting her but he was definitely preventing as little movement as possible.

"Black! GET OFF ME!" she wheezed, but she was paralyzed. With the exception of her racing heart, all of her muscles had suddenly clenched and tensed beneath him, and as much she'd like to blame it on the potion the healer had given her, she knew it had more to do with the attractive boy on the bed with her.

It was the first time they'd touched each other in weeks, maybe months, not since they'd snogged on Halloween like there was no tomorrow… The morning after, Grace had blamed it on the alcohol, and had done everything in her power to convince herself and everyone else that that Sir Bottlebum's Wicked Rum the only reason why she snogged Sirius Black. Luckily, Grace had no idea that despite going out of her way to avoid touching, flirting, staring or even smiling at him the wrong way, she wasn't fooling anyone. Last night was proof of that.

"I'll murder you if you don't move!" she threatened.

"They're going to murder you if you won't quit moving around. The healers said you're supposed to lie still," he reminded her, looking remarkably serious for someone who you could rarely take seriously. It was ironic considering that his name was Sirius Black.

"It's been like three hours!" she complained.

"It's only been twenty minutes," Sirius informed her.

Grace groaned, knowing that he was right on both accounts.

"I can't sit still. I'm going mental!"

"I noticed." He grinned. "You're practically crackling with energy. I think you might be trembling."

Grace felt her face flush knowing that being confined to a hospital bed for the past hour wasn't the only reason why she was shaking. She could keep telling herself and everyone else that she had only snogged him because she was drunk, but her body always betrayed her.

"You're crushing me," she lied.

"Sorry." He eased himself up off of her, just enough so that she could breathe easily again. He was still too close for comfort, though, because her heart continued to race. When it became apparent that he wasn't planning on moving, she cleared her throat.

"You're still on top of me."

"I'm barely touching you!" he protested, but he retracted his arm and shifted so that they were lying side by side. However he did not get off the bed. Instead he settled in on his stomach beside her and closed his eyes.

"Black!"

"That chair's so bloody uncomfortable I'll probably never feel my buttocks again!" he whined. Grace snorted, there was always an ulterior motive. "Besides," he continued, "maybe you'll stop moving around and relax if I stay here."

Grace opened her mouth to tell him that relaxing was the last thing she was going to be able to do with him in such close proximity, but she didn't want to admit that he was affecting her and he did seem to be having a calming effect on her. She was no longer fidgeting and her heart beat had slowed down to its normal rate. In fact, everything seemed to be slowing down. Sirius grinned, as she realized what the healer had also slipped into the potion. Bastards.

"Was it a sleeping draught or a calming draught?" she asked, even as her eyelids started to grow heavy.

"Not sure, but the healer said it'd kick in a half hour," he yawned and snuggled closer to her, knowing there was nothing she could do about it.

"You're incorrigible and a prick, you know that?"

"Sweet dreams," Sirius responded cheekily, patting the top of her head.

Grace's last thought before sleep took her was that she hoped the healers or her uncle caught him in bed with her and threw his sorry arse out.


Sirius knew the exact moment when Grace finally fell asleep, not because he had spent several nights in the past year watching over her as she slept, but because she started to snore. He chuckled aloud, unafraid of waking her, now that the draught had kicked in. She'd be out for at least another three hours, the healers had assured him of that, which was why they had insisted on someone staying with her. James's mother had the flu, and his father was called away to the Ministry, so James stayed with his mother while Sirius took Grace to her appointment.

Sirius didn't understand why it was necessary for the healers to drag her back into St. Mungos just to give her a sleeping draught. But it seemed to him that the healers had done a lot of useless tests on Gracie in the past six months. Not that he blamed them. Grace had been hit with a curse that no one had ever survived, and yet miraculously she had made a full recovery over the course of a few months. Or at least it had seemed that way.

Sirius propped himself up on his elbow so that he could gaze down at the girl beside her. As he reached out to brush an errant strand of hair from her face, he was struck by how much younger she looked as she slept. In the past year they'd all been forced to grow up fast, even Sirius, though he would never acknowledge it. But Grace had aged more prematurely and noticeably after her family was brutally murdered over a year ago and when she had spent months recovering from the curse meant to kill her. Watching her sleep now, he was suddenly reminded of the eleven-year old that he encountered in Knockturn Alley. Because of her height she had always appeared older, but on that day her eyes had betrayed a naivety that she wouldn't lose until sixteen. Even when he'd come across her in that run down shop with that slimy little Slytherin, Grace had insisted that it had been nothing more than a childish scuffle rather than an attempt on her life. Sirius suspected that Grace had repeated the lie so many times that she'd come to believe it. But in the past year Grace had been forced to see the truth, the whole truth, and it had taken something out of her that Sirius desperately wished that he could give her back. He had remorselessly robbed more than one girl of their innocence, but never before had he ever felt the urge to preserve it. It was disconcerting for Sirius and it made him willing to accept Grace's efforts to keep him at arm's length, most of the time.

Lying beside her warm unconscious body in the bed, Sirius found it hard not to take advantage of the situation, but he knew that now was not the time. He sat up, hesitated, and then pressed a chaste kiss to the corner of her mouth.

"Sweet dreams, Gracie," he whispered. He got to his feet just as the door swung open, admitting three healers dressed in the standard uniform green robes.

"Is she out?" the eldest demanded, not even looking up from the clip board in his hand.

Sirius nodded and shoved his hands into his pockets. He didn't like the unpleasant wizard in charge of Grace's case but he was supposedly one of the best in the Wizarding World. The wizard let go of the clip board and barked orders at the other two as he went to Gracie. The clip board bobbed along behind him, smacking Sirius over the head as it passed. Sirius scowled at the healer and rubbed the back of his head.

"You may leave now," the healer said without looking up from his patient. It wasn't a suggestion. He had Grace's slender wrist in his hand and his wand aimed at her throat. Sirius didn't like the way the healer was manhandling her.

"What are you doing to her?" Sirius stepped forward, wanting to put himself between Grace and the wizard.

"Take him outside," the healer ordered.

"I want to stay with her," Sirius insisted, but a freckled hand curled around his forearm and propelled him toward the door. Sirius could have easily slipped out of the girl's grasp but the shock of recognition momentarily stilled him.

"Don't make me call security," the head healer snarled, misinterpreting Sirius's hesitance. The girl widened her eyes meaningfully and nodded toward the door. Sirius sighed and with one last look over his shoulder, he followed her outside.

The door hadn't even shut behind them before Sirius rounded on her.

"What's going on in there? What are they planning on doing to her?"

"Hello, Sirius. I had a splendid holiday, thank you for asking," Mary Pewter said, pulling herself up to her full height and adjusting her spectacles. He hadn't seen her in months, but she still looked like she should have been patrolling the halls at Hogwarts, fulfilling her duties as the Head Girl. Except she wasn't the Head Girl anymore, Lily Evans was, and Mary had moved on apparently to become a healer: a healer assigned to Grace's case.

"Mary, I want to know what's going on, right now." Sirius knew he was going about this all wrong. He was Sirius Black for Merlin's sake, Hogwart's Most Eligible Bachelor, and Mary Pewter was a girl he knew he could charm; but when Sirius saw the healers come in like that and immediately asked him to leave, it had unsettled him. Something felt strange about this whole "checkup" and Sirius wanted to know that Grace was alright.

"I'd love to tell you Sirius," Mary said, shaking her head. "But Grace's file is classified. As a trainee assigned to the healer in charge of her case I am expected to respect the privacy rights of not only Gracie but the healers and researchers assigned to her case - "

"Mary, please!" Sirius pleaded, interrupting her spiel before she could close herself off from him entirely. Changing tactics, he started to move in on her but Mary ducked beneath his arm.

"That's not going to work on me, Black," she chuckled, sweeping past him. Sirius blew out a frustrated breath and then raced after her.

"Mary, this is important!" he begged as he easily caught up to her.

"My job happens to be important to me too, you know. In case you've been living under a rock for the past seventeen years, less than eleven percent of applicants manage to land a placement at St. Mungo's and of those only –"

"I'm worried about her," Sirius blurted out.

Mary stopped so suddenly that Sirius ran right into her. She spun to face him.

"Good Golly, you heard about the other girl, didn't you?" she whispered, her eyes widening.

Sirius didn't know what the hell she was talking about but now he had her full attention. Taking advantage of the moment, he slung an arm around her shoulders.

"Come on, Mary, I only want to ask you –"

"Not here!" Mary hissed, glancing around nervously. Sirius didn't note anything suspicious about the passing healers and visitors, but Mary was twitching as if you-know-who himself was lurking in their midst. She leaned closer to him and started mumbling under her breath. Fortunately Sirius had excellent hearing.

"Meet me in the chapel in a half hour."

Then she slipped out from beneath his arm and disappeared into a group of green robes.

Sirius would have been annoyed that she was making him wait like this, but it took him the better part of the thirty minutes to find the room. He could have asked for directions of course, but Sirius was a Marauder and Marauders don't ask for directions, they make their own trails. Luckily Sirius only searched two of the floors before deciding to start back down at the ground floor. He was a terribly curious person and it took him all of thirty seconds before he decided to push open the big old wooden door at the end of the hallway.

The smell of smoke and incense let him know he'd found the right place even before he saw them standing together in the shafts of colored light that came through the stained glass windows. Blinded by the rainbows, Sirius almost missed the wand that was lifted and aimed at his head.

He ducked just in time. The heavy door slammed shut behind him, locking him in.

"Blimey, Bones, are you trying to decapitate me?" Sirius cursed the bloke standing beside Mary with his wand still raised.

"Relax," Edgar Bones said, though he stood so stiffly that he looked anything but relaxed. "I just want to be sure that no one follows you in here. I don't want us to be overheard."

"Well, you could have just said something instead of scaring the hell out of me," Sirius grumbled, but he quietly cast his own spell to assure that they didn't have any eavesdroppers just in case. Then he turned to take in the pair before him.

Unlike Mary, the former Head Boy had changed a lot in the months since he'd graduated Hogwarts. He wore the robes of an Auror in training now and had shaved his head and lost weight, but it wasn't the physical differences that bothered Sirius. He hadn't put his wand away and there was a seriousness about him that was nothing like the pompous Head Boy façade that they'd all enjoyed making fun of. Oddly, the unfailingly polite Hufflepuff hadn't smiled or moved to shake Sirius's hand like he did with everyone. Sirius wondered if Eddie had a problem with him or was just having an off day, but Mary was watching her former partner with the same wariness that Sirius felt.

"So," Sirius cleared his throat and joined the pair by the altar. "Are we going to talk about Gracie?"

"First," Eddie pointed his wand at him again, "I want to know how you found out about Athena."

"Athena?" Sirius backed up a step. The name vaguely meant something to him but Sirius didn't understand what this had to do with Gracie.

"Athena Jones," Eddie clarified for him, but it didn't help him much. He knew who she was now. Athena was the prettier of the two Jones siblings or at least she would have been if she hadn't been so silly and worn so much makeup. Sirius remembered her now. She had been a year behind Hestia and two years ahead of him and some of the boys had called her Aphrodite. He might've gone out with her once or snogged her in the Astronomy Tower. He thought she'd danced with him at that New Year's Eve party last night but he couldn't remember and frankly he was too concerned about Gracie to care. But Mary and Eddie were staring at him as if he was supposed to be having some sort of epiphany.

"What about her?" he asked carefully.

"She's dead."

Sirius blinked at Eddie and then shook his head.

"I'm sorry. I didn't know that she had died," he said shocked. He'd just seen the girl hours ago alive and well.

"You didn't know?" Eddie's voice was like flint.

"No, this is the first I heard of it," Sirius confessed. Eddie turned his steely gaze on Mary and she flinched away from him.

"I'm sorry, Eddie, he was so worried about her that I thought he knew, and then I didn't know how he found out and I panicked and–"

"It's alright, Mary," Eddie said quietly, but it was obvious that it was not alright. Sirius didn't care though. All he cared about at the moment was Gracie and they'd already wasted enough time.

"Look, Mary, why don't we talk about Gracie and then I'll pretend that we never had this conversation, okay?" Sirius suggested.

"We are talking about Gracie!" Mary snapped.

Eddie closed his eyes and Sirius knew that Mary had just made another mistake and told him something she shouldn't have.

"Mary…" Eddie's tone was a warning. But Mary didn't flinch away from him this time and instead stood up straighter. She was morphing into the Head Girl that she once was and suddenly it was like they were all back at Hogwarts with the two of them discussing whether or not to dock points from him.

"Eddie, I don't care about what the Aurors think is best. I think that someone should know."

"Her uncle will be told of course."

"Her uncle's not going to be at Hogwarts! Her uncle's not going to be able to protect her all the time."

"Neither is Sirius!" Eddie's voice echoed through the chapel and the illusion was shattered. They were not at Hogwarts and this was not a matter of docking points or writing him up but something much more serious. Eddie sighed as he looked at Mary and something in him seemed to break. "Mary, if it's true, if he really did survive, I don't think anyone will be able to stop him."

"Who? Who survived?" Sirius asked, feeling like an idiot.

Mary's face fell and her shoulders slumped.

"The Aurors think that they have proof that Evan Wilkes survived the mausoleum collapse," she whispered.

Sirius flashed back to that horrible night, but the thing that stuck out most in his mind was Grace's battered body on the floor of the mausoleum. Even though it had been you-know-who that had been threatening to kill her, Evan Wilkes was the one that brought her there and reduced her to that bloody state. Wilkes had been the one that set the whole thing in motion, and Sirius had hoped along with everyone else that he had died a very painful death when Lily brought the roof of the mausoleum down on the Death Eater's heads.

"How can you be so sure?" Sirius asked, hoping that there was still a chance he was dead.

"Athena Jones," Eddie said wearily. Sirius was already sick of Athena Jones.

"What the hell does Athena Jones have to do with Gracie and Wilkes?"

"Well, he murdered her, I think that's proof that he's still alive," Eddie said drily. "Athena was found this morning and his DNA is all over the mutilated body as is spellwork and if that wasn't enough proof he transfigured her features so that she looked less like Athena and more like…" he tapered off, swallowing hard.

"Like what?" Sirius forced himself to ask, though he really, really didn't want to know. Eddie and Mary exchanged a look and then Mary shakily answered.

"Grace. He branded Grace's name into her chest."

Suddenly, Sirius had to sit down. Eddie caught him by the elbow, helping him over to one of the stone benches. They sat down on either side of him, exchanging anxious looks over the top of his head but thankfully not making any effort to touch or console him. Sirius leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees and burying his hands in his hair. He counted the red candles that lined the altar until he was sure that he wasn't going to throw up.

"Is that why they brought Gracie in today?" Sirius inquired, and if his voice was a lot weaker and thinner than usual they pretended not to notice. "They just wanted to make sure she was okay?"

Sirius missed the look that passed between Eddie and Mary.

"Yes."

"So, she's alright? I mean she didn't relapse or anything. It's just a standard checkup, right?"

He never saw the internal struggle that played out across Mary's face in that long drawn out moment of hesitance and he didn't notice the way her voice shook or how she had to look away from Eddie and Sirius and the stained glass windows and the altar before them.

"Yes, Sirius, Gracie's fine," she reassured him.

Sirius closed his eyes, blissfully unaware of the fact that it was a blatant lie.

Mary had to get up and leave.


The first thing Grace saw when she woke up was Mary Pewter, kneeling by her bedside. The former Head Girl hadn't been assigned to Grace's case until the final weeks of Grace's prolonged stay at St. Mungos, but during that short amount of time Mary had learned more about Gracie than even her family and closest friends knew. Grace in turn, had learned to read Mary very quickly, which is how she knew almost instinctively that Sirius had cornered Mary.

"You told him," Grace whispered accusingly.

"No." Mary shook her head and Grace relaxed. Mary was a horrible liar which was one of the reasons why Grace was glad she'd been assigned to her case. Most of the other healers tried to sugarcoat things and talked in dizzying circles but Mary blurted things out and didn't understand the art of bull shitting.

"I couldn't," Mary whispered, hiding her face in her arms. Grace knew how hard it was for her, keeping this up, but Mary hadn't let her down yet.

"Thank you," Grace said, touching the girl's shoulder.

Mary rolled her head to the side just enough so that she could look at her through her lopsided spectacles.

"Are you ever going to tell them?" she asked.

Grace responded with a bitter smile.

"I think I'm still hoping I won't have to."

Mary removed her glasses and rubbed hard at her eyes. "Grace," she sighed. "Don't you think that maybe you should break it to them now before -"

"No," Grace said firmly. She threw back the sheets and swung her legs over the side of the bed.

"Grace, you can't just - stop!" Mary burst out, just as Grace stumbled from the bed and into the bedside table. Mary was at her side in an instant, reminding her that the draught still needed some time to wear off. Grace cursed softly, shaking Mary off as she leaned against the bedpost to impatiently await the return of her equilibrium.

Mary regarded her with that exasperated look that she'd worn so many times when she'd caught the younger students doing something particularly stupid or silly.

"You won't be able to hide it forever." Mary was simply stating the obvious but it still made Grace mad.

"I know," she snapped back, sitting down on the edge of the bed. "I think that I know that better than anyone else. And it's not like I'm hiding anything I'm just trying to be myself again and live a normal life…" she finished lamely. But that was a lie, because she wasn't herself anymore and nothing had never been normal. All that had changed when her family had been torn from her, and then just when she had been putting the pieces back together, everything had gone straight to hell again. But Grace was a strong girl and always had been, but still there was only so much a girl could take especially after one found out-

"It's going to get worse."

Mary's voice broke her out of her reverie.

"What?"

"You had another one just this week, didn't you?" Mary sat down carefully on the bed beside her. Grace closed herself off but she couldn't block Mary out completely. The older girl placed a hand on her shoulder.

"Grace, you've built up an immunity to the potion."

"I can deal with it," she insisted stubbornly.

"Gracie," Mary's use of her nickname forced Grace to look at her. "You're not going to be dealing with it for much longer unless you listen to me."

"I know the god damn healer outlined all my options –"

"Except for one."

Something about Mary's tone stopped Gracie mid-rant.

"Look," Mary began, nervously wringing her hands. "I – er- kind of did some of my own research, well, not really my research per se but I talked to Ophelia."

Grace stood up so quickly that she almost lost her balance again.

"You talked to that nut case?" she snarled. "About my case!"

"She's better now!" Mary retorted. "And she used to be your friend!"

"That was before I found out that she murdered my mother!" Grace reminded her.

"It wasn't her fault." But even though Mary was right, it didn't make it hurt any less. Ophelia had only been acting under the imperius curse but she had unwillingly played a part in the betrayal that led to the murder of everyone in the Adams family. Lily's version of the events had been deliberately vague when it came to the part Ophelia played, but after a sobbing, half delirious, and intoxicated Ophelia paid Grace a visit in the middle of the night near the end of her stay at St. Mungo's to apologize, Grace was forced to hear every last detail. She agreed to accept the apology and forgive her just to make the frightening apparition go away. Security had had to come and literally tear Ophelia off of her, dragging her kicking and screaming away to the psychiatric ward where she then spent a lengthy amount of time for what was deemed a nervous breakdown.

"I don't care whether or not it was her fault. She's a loose cannon that shouldn't be anywhere near this."

"You're right," Mary agreed nodding. "But she wants to make amends for what she did to you. She has to. And she's the only one that's brilliant and intuitive enough to understand all of Rohan's research and notes and where he might have gone with it if he had lived."

That stilled Gracie. Rohan, Lily's old boyfriend that had been murdered because he had tried to help them, was the only one that had done any extensive research on the side effects and reversal of the dark curse that had taken the life of his grandfather, the former Minister of Magic, and had nearly claimed Grace's life as well. It was because of Rohan's work in the field that Gracie was still breathing.

"You're brilliant why don't you read them?" Gracie asked, but she already knew what was coming.

"Ophelia and Rohan were two very different people but they were on the same wavelength."

Grace snorted, because Rohan was about as odd as Ophelia was normal.

"Intellectually," Mary corrected herself. "Intellectually they were on the same wave length."

Grace shook her head in disbelief, but again she couldn't completely disagree with Mary. Both Ravenclaws had excelled in almost every subject at Hogwarts and it was only because of their urge to more extensively pursue other branches of magic that withheld them from the top of their class.

"Grace, I'm not telling you to take her up on her offer, all I'm asking is for you to consider it. I met with her the other day to look over the proposal. If she could just run a few more tests…"

"More tests!" Grace wanted nothing more to do with these "tests".

"By golly, Gracie, just listen to what I'm saying!" Mary was practically shouting now. "The healers they can't stop this. Eventually they're going to put you in a magically induced coma."

Grace stopped in her tracks, horrified.

"Seriously?" she gasped.

"It extended the Minister's life for several weeks…" Mary pointed out.

There was no way in hell that Gracie was going to let them put her in a magically induced coma for several weeks. She'd already lost too much and more than enough time.

"Fine, fill me in," she said, sitting down and folding her arms of her chest. "I'm listening now."

Mary hesitated.

"You're not going to like it," she admitted.

"Just tell me."

Mary was right. Grace didn't like it. She hated it.


It was dark by the time Grace was released back into the care of Sirius. She was unusually quiet and so wrapped up in her own thoughts that she barely noticed the odd silence of her companion. They exited St. Mungo's and had almost reached the apparation point in the alley next door when Sirius reached for her hand.

Instead of apparating, he pulled her in close.

"Are you alright?" he asked.

"Fine," she insisted, but her voice wasn't much more than a whisper. He brought his other hand up to the side of her face as if he were expecting to find physical proof of the injury that was weighing her down. But the problem wasn't physical but internal. She was keeping secrets from him, but she wasn't the only one that was hiding something.

"What's the matter with you?" she asked, frowning. "You're acting as if someone died."

Someone had died, but it wasn't the dead girl that he was grieving for. He slid his hand to her neck, resting his thumb over the pulse point. And even though it still beat steadily he knew that he was already losing her. He remembered what Eddie had said, hell, he'd witnessed with his own eyes what that monster Wilkes had done to Gracie and Rohan. If it was true, nothing was going to stop Evan Wilkes from hurting Grace Adams again. Nothing.

"Oh Merlin, someone did die! Who was it Sirius?" Grace asked her alarm growing.

"Athena Jones," he said dully.

He lifted his eyes from her pulse point and met her gaze. Her eyes were still that same bright blue and they held so much emotion in that moment that it was impossible to think of that light ever being distinguished.

"C'mere," he whispered.

He folded her into his arms, pulling her tightly against his body. He could feel her heart beating and he decided right then and there that he'd do anything to keep it that way. He'd keep her safe. And so would the Potters and Lily and all of the other people that loved her. Already he was feeling better. Athena Jones had been a warning but now Sirius knew and he'd keep an eye on her. No one was going to hurt her, not while he was still breathing.


Breathe in. Breathe out. Breathe in. Breathe out.

Evan Wilkes opened his eyes and stared up at the ornate ceiling of the unplottable mansion that he'd inherited on his seventeenth birthday. It was no use. He could not sleep, not while she still breathed. He sat up, perching on the edge of the ivory sofa that still served as a centerpiece in the family's best parlor, though only Evan lived there now. He faced the fireplace and the large gilded frame that held the family portrait. His parents stared down at him with the same grey eyes that he'd inherited. He was also in the frame but he was only a babe and even though they had the same eyes, he couldn't recognize himself. He hated the painting because it was all he had left of his parents and yet for whatever reason the figures in the painting stopped speaking to him as soon as their lives were extinguished. His father's last words had been for him to avenge his mother's death and even though her murderer was dead, Evan hadn't been the one to kill her.

It felt wrong that Evan had been the one that had pushed for the destruction of the Adams family and not only did Gracie survive twice but some crazy girl under the imperius curse got to accidentally kill her mother.

He thought that leaving Gracie an orphan might be enough. But it wasn't enough. He needed her. But every time he turned around it seemed that there was some new friend or family member swooping in to save her. They'd be all over her as soon as word got out about what he done to the Jones girl. He would've enjoyed taking them all on but Evan couldn't possibly kill all of them especially now that the Dark Lord had an agenda of his own that didn't involve the weapon that the Adams family had been practically sitting on.

He stood up and began pacing, perhaps he didn't have to track down and kill all of them. Maybe there was another way to get to her…


A/N: Thanks to everyone that reviewed! Sorry, I haven't been able to write lately but this has been on my hard drive for months and months. I don't plan on this to be anywhere near the length of I'll Fight For You and I'm hoping to have it done in 10 chapters or less. The next chapter has been done for months and just needs to be cleaned up so let me know what you think and hopefully I'll post it soon! Also I have another unrelated Lily and James story that I was thinking of posting if anyone's interested.