Disclaimer: Harry Potter plot and characters belong to JK Rowling; any original characters or plot points are mine. Not intended for sale or profit; please do not repost without permission.

Note: Thanks to my reviewers, I deeply appreciate both the encouragement and the critiques, and take all of it to heart! Please continue to enjoy the story – we're half way through!

Chapter 3

Three Unforgivable Sins

Remus fished his copy of the Daily Prophet out of the plate of eggs where the owl had dropped it and unfolded it, grateful to have something to occupy his mind – and his eyes, which kept straying down the table towards the vibrant red-head he had kissed last evening. Even now the mere thought made him hot enough that steam should be swirling out of his ears. He hastily untied the paper.

Hmmm… delegates from the Japanese Ministry were in London for talks on transcontinental floo neworking. Razorback rock hogs had been seen migrating through the woodlands surrounding Hogsmeade earlier than expected this year. The value of the galleon had fallen 2 points due to a cave-in in a goblin mine in southern Wales. A house wife in Dublin accidentally transfigured her muggle neighbor's dog into a barking pink flamingo lawn ornament.

Remus flipped through the pages, not really absorbing any of it. His thoughts were lost in a delicious haze hope and trepidation… and truthfully, guilt.

He was in love with the same girl as his best friend - one of his only friends. James had carried a flame for Lily since their first trip on the Hogwarts Express. The thought of being with Lily made his chest – and yes, other parts – go all hot and tingly. But it made something clench coldly in his gut to think of how it would hurt James. The mix of hope and shame was nearly nauseating.

Remus had loved Lily since last spring. He had never felt this way about anyone before, had never dared. What if he had a chance with her? Could he really live with the regret of never finding out? Besides, James could have just about any girl he wanted. Lily was the only girl at Hogwarts – or anywhere – that knew his secret, and by some miracle she was neither disgusted nor afraid. That kind of lightening wasn't likely to strike twice. Didn't Remus deserve this chance to find love? Could he really afford not to try? And it wasn't as though he were sabotaging James' chances with Lily, or doing anything underhanded. He was simply throwing his hat in the ring as a contender, fair and square, and now it was up to Lily to choose who she liked best.

Foggy, lupine memories of running wild through the moonlit trees beside a huge black dog and a majestic stag with a rat clinging to its antlers flashed through the front of his mind, along with another violent stab of guilt. Remus cringed, bit desperately into a sausage link and buried his head in the paper.

He smelled James approaching long before he heard or saw him, but he resisted the urge to look up, though not out of a guilty conscience - well, not entirely. People tended to forget that being a werewolf meant more than fur and fangs; his heightened sense of smell stayed with him all the time, and it really made people uncomfortable to know that he could smell them coming. He'd learned not to react to a person's approach until others acknowledged it. He hoped it made him seem… more human.

As such, it was a rare thing that an approaching person could surprise him. Yet James managed it today.

"You kissed Evans?!"

Remus jumped and dropped the paper, the color draining from his face. How had he found out?!

But James wasn't looking at him. He was glaring down at Sirius where he sat next to Remus, a scrap of paper clenched in his shaking fist. Peter sat across the table from them, eyes darting between their two friends almost frantically. Sirius had paused mid-chew, his face demonstrating his own surprise at the outburst, then flinched slightly as James actually threw the wadded parchment at him, not entirely unlike a petulant child. It bounced off of Sirius' head and landed in the same unfortunate plate of eggs.

The surprise on Sirius' face slowly morphed into something more complex and a bad feeling blossomed in the pit of Remus' stomach. Keeping his eyes on his friends, he fished the parchment from the food. Smoothing it out, Remus scanned it, brow drawing down with each passing word.

I saw Sirius Black kissing Lily Evans.
Some friend he is. You shouldn't let him get away with it.

Remus frowned. The writing looked vaguely familiar – surely this was one of the other boys playing a joke…

Slowly, Sirius finished chewing, swallowed, then pushed himself to his feet to face James. He looked James right in the eye and shrugged.

"What if I did?" he replied soberly, not even a trace of his usual mocking laughter in his voice.

Remus felt his jaw drop open. Sirius? Sirius had kissed Lily?

A knee-jerk surge of irrational jealousy assailed him, followed directly by a fresh surge of guilt that doused his system like a bucket of ice water. What right did he have to be jealous? Lily wasn't his to be possessive of. And hadn't he just done the exact same thing? He looked down at his breakfast, ashamed and still irrepressibly jealous in spite of himself, and discovered that he was no longer hungry.

Unfortunately for Sirius, James had no weight of counterbalance his jealous fury. So he reacted the way he usually did when confronted with volatile emotions he didn't know how to handle. He pulled his fist back and hit Sirius.

The punch connected solidly across Sirius's jaw, and then Sirius was on the ground, wiping blood from his lip and glaring up at James in astonished outrage. James stooped and grabbed him by the front of his robes, all but dragging him back to his feet.

"She's mine," James practically growled, hurt swirling with anger and amplifying it until he was red in the face with rage. "You know that!"

"I don't see your name written on her anywhere," Sirius sneered, knocking James' hand away from his clothes and stepping back.

The next instant, both boys had their wands in their hands. Remus went for his own, intending to stop them before things got really out of hand, but he needn't have bothered.

"Stop it! Both of you!"

A shimmering shield spell sprang up between them as Lily shoved her way through the gathering crowd. Remus felt his heart seize up when he saw there were tears on her face. He could tell the others had seen as well, because they dropped their wands to their sides instantly.

James's face lit up in the strangest way when he saw her, a weird, disgruntled mix of longing and confusion, while on the other hand, Sirius' face shut down almost completely, hiding away his thoughts behind an uncharacteristic mask of stone.

"E…Evans..." James took a step towards her.

"Don't you dare, James Potter!" she sniffed, taking a defensive step backward and wiping viciously at eyes narrowed in angry disappointment. "I don't belong to anybody but myself! Merlin's beard, James, don't you ever get tired of solving your problems with your fists?"

Before anyone else could speak, she gave a watery hiccup and ran from the hall.

Severus watched the altercation between Potter and Black through the stringy fall of his hair from where he sat at the Slytherin table correcting one of the formulas in his Potions text book. Severus knew how to watch and listen, quietly and discreetly, so that no one noticed. He watched so much, and so well, that he knew things that others would rather he not know. And he was always watching Lily.

For instance, Severus knew why Lily kept misplacing her possessions. It was an easy thing to miss unless you were constantly watching.

And he'd known before anyone else that she'd received not one kiss, but two.

Jealousy, resentment and regret beaded together into a burning black lump in his chest, and it flared darkly at the thought of those animals touching her, sizzling in a barely banked flame of bitter rage. How could she? How could she associate with that slug-brained thug and his gang of knuckle-draggers? Even if she hated him now… how could she?

He'd given her the Sugar Bees to remind her: he'd known her first, and he knew her best, and she was just as guilty of fraternizing with the enemy as he had ever been. It was merely icing on the cake that Potter cut off his own nose because of it, and pure pleasure to watch the bonehead brigade begin falling like dominoes ever since, betraying and backstabbing each other, acting like a pack of grunting gorillas, beating their chests over who would get to drag the female off into the bushes. Both hilarious and vaguely sickening.

Best of all, while they were busy turning each other, they had no time to gang up on him. The moment Potter had decked Black may have been the high point of his school life. He could not have hoped for more if he'd planned it himself. And if he were half the Slytherin he hoped he was, he would sit back with a bowl of popcorn and watch gleefully as they self-destructed.

There was only one tiny flaw in what had the potential to be a perfect storm. And it damned the whole venture.

Lily was crying.

Of course, Severus knew what those tears meant – what they really meant. Because he was always watching her; he'd known her first, and he knew her best. The reality of her feelings, the reality that she herself didn't even understand yet, made that hideous black coal in his chest burn white hot, made him almost glad she was hurting, even as it crippled him with pain to see her suffer.

Severus tried to tell himself that she had brought it on herself; that she deserved it for choosing them over him. How could she? How could she!

Two-faced mudblood bitch…

Just thinking those words made something inside him constrict hard enough to drive a small groan of anguish through his clenched teeth.

He would never forgive those bastards, for taking her away, not as long as he lived.

He would never forgive himself, for directing that vile word at her and driving her out of reach forever.

And he'd never forgive her, for being happy without him. He squeezed his burning eyes shut against the prick of tears. Never.

But the only thing in the world that was worse than seeing Lily happy, was seeing Lily unhappy. He could live with seeing her happy, even if his world was lightless and cold without her. But it would kill him to stand by and watch her cry when there might be something he could do to stop it.

So when she pushed her way out of the Great Hall, he gave up the chance to watch Professor Sprout snag Potter and Black by their ears and drag them, struggling, off to the Headmaster's office. Instead, he stowed his book and quill and slipped unseen away from his laughing classmates.

Lily made it out the front entrance and as far as the lower courtyard before she finally broke down in tears. She climbed onto a small stone bench set back in a shallow alcove in the castle wall, tucked her knees up to her chest and let herself cry out her frustration.

After a few minutes, the tears abated and she leaned her head back against the stone to stare up at the sky. She didn't know why the sight of the sky calmed her so, but she loved to lose herself in it. It was like her head was too small for all her thoughts and they would get all jumbled together. Then she'd pour them out into the sky, where there was plenty of room for them to stretch and assemble, and when she came back down to Earth, it was usually with a better idea of what she was really thinking.

She had lain under the tree by the lake for hours yesterday and watched the sky cycle through all the colors of sunset, puzzling over what to do and say, and to whom, and most of all, what it was she wanted in all this. That last was the troublesome part, because she really didn't know anymore, and all the rest seemed to hinge on it.

Sirius Black said he liked her. He was good looking, fun, charming and funny. But he seemed apt to mask difficult feelings with a humor that often turned cruel or vicious. From watching him, she had no doubt he would make an excellent friend, but she didn't want to date someone who could be so dishonest with himself, and so rough with other peoples' emotions.

Remus Lupin was sweet, intelligent and thoughtful. And yes, he was a werewolf. She was sure that made him lonely, in spite of having three close friends and many friendly acquaintances, but she couldn't bring herself to be the one to fill that gap. He lacked confidence in himself, and there was a sort of neediness to him that made her nervous. She didn't fancy him, she felt sorry for him. He deserved so much better than that in a girlfriend.

Which left James Potter, whom she was just beginning to suspect might not actually be joking around when he asked her out over and over again.

Potter was like Sirius in that he was attractive, fun and charming; and he was like Remus in that he was intelligent and capable of being thoughtful. But he had rather too much confidence, and rather than sweeping his emotions under the rug, he seemed almost incapable of keeping them out of everyone's faces – often literally. That could be a wonderful thing when he was allowing his heart to lead him to stand up for his friends or do the right thing – but it seemed like it was equally likely at any given moment to have him attacking his classmates or talking down to people like they were beneath him.

The sky had gone red before she'd organized all this in her mind, and she still hadn't figured out what she was going to do. Morning had brought no further insight, and seeing Potter laying his fists on his friend only muddied the water further. No matter how hard she thought, she couldn't find a solution that would make all of them happy, and keep from hurting any of their feelings.

All her thoughts continued to circle back to James Potter. Every time the thought of him entered her mind, the overriding reaction was one of profound and irrational annoyance, frustration and disgust.

It was as she sat there on that stone bench, sorting her thoughts in the sky, that it occurred to her to ask herself why Potter made her so much angrier than anyone else… Something clicked in her head, and her red-rimmed eyes widened.

Could it be that she got angrier with Potter because she expected more from Potter? Maybe even wanted more from Potter? Was that why the sight of him pummeling his own friend over her had filled her with such disappointment and tears? Sure he was attractive and popular, but he was also a bully. He'd tormented Sev for years… and I need to stop factoring Sev into my decisions. He made his choices. I have to start making mine.

As though her thoughts had summoned him, a familiar shadow fell across her were she sat curled on the stone bench.

"Some free advice, Evans."

Lily didn't have to look up. She would know that voice anywhere.

"I have nothing to say to you right now, Snape," she replied thickly, stuffy from crying. Sniffing her snot and tears away with as much dignity as she could muster, she shot to her feet and turned to go.

A black clad arm shot out to slam against the wall in front of her chest, blocking her path. She turned, shocked and met Sev's vaguely hostile glare. Had his eyes always been so cold? No, they weren't like this last time we stood this close. Last time, when she'd ended their friendship. Had… had she done this to him? Something broke inside of her.

"Sev…"

He closed his eyes at the endearment, and when they opened, they were softer - but that softness only served to expose a burning pain smoldering beyond the hardened barriers he kept between himself and the world, one that was slowly being converted into bitterness inside him.

"You're too nice, Lil," he told her, and she nearly broke down in tears again to hear him call her by her childhood nickname. But his words threw her for a loop.

"I don't understand what you mean," she whispered.

Sev snorted. "Of course you don't," he muttered bitterly, glancing away in pained irritation before pinning her with his intense black gaze once more. When he spoke there was a note of sincerity in his voice that caused her to have an astonishing epiphany.

"You're sweet and smart and kind and beautiful," he told her. "You're too nice. You make people hope too much. You make people love you, when there's no way you can love them back."

In that profound moment of paradigm shift, she realized he wasn't just talking about James Potter, Sirius Black, and Remus Lupin. He was talking about himself.

Her cheeks flamed. How had she missed it?

"S-Sev… I…"

Their eyes locked, and he seemed to search her soul. Whatever he saw there made a glacial chill invade his gaze once more. He leaned closer, so that they were almost literally nose to nose. She could feel his breath on her face and she cringed, afraid he'd try to kiss her. But he didn't come any closer. When his spoke, his tone was almost tender, but the words lanced through her heart like a javelin.

"You're too nice. And that makes you cruel."

In the next instant his oppressive dark presence was gone, and before she could breathe he was a meter away and gaining distance. Her bottom lip quivered as his words sank in and struck a deeply buried nerve that she'd never known was there. The hurt of it poured out in a torrent of anger.

"Oh, I'm cruel? Is that so?" she called after him, her voice ragged and harsh with sarcasm. "Well thank you so very much for that lovely bit of advice. Always there for me, aren't you, Sev?"

He paused, and turned his head so that she could just see the jagged line of his profile.

"I'll always be there for you, Lily Evans. Always."

Then he swept around the corner of the building and was gone.

It had worked! Perfectly! Ever since his sorting, Peter had wondered if he really belonged in Gryffindor, 'where dwell the brave at heart'. Well, it had taken six years to find out, but now he knew: when he gathered up his courage to act, he could make things happen the way he wanted them to! Things like making Lily Evans recoil from James; from James Potter, who always got everything he wanted!

Peter was nearly giddy with his success as he scurried up towards his secret hideaway. Closing the door behind him, he lifted the lid on his treasure box and took stock of its contents: a blue hair ribbon, a pocket mirror, a stick of muggle lip balm, a charm bracelet and a quill. He caressed each item adoringly, before reaching into his pocket to fish out the newest addition.

It was a wizarding photograph of Lily with Mary Macdonald and Penny Aston, taken at the King's Cross Station. Lily smiled happily at him from the photograph. Peter smiled shyly back.

Then his brow furrowed sourly as Aston put her arm around Lily's shoulder. A surge of jealous anger gave an ugly tug inside his belly. Narrowing his eyes, he pulled out his wand and muttered a spell through the sneer that twisted his face. Macdonald and Aston opened their mouths in silent screams as the spell struck the photo. When the smoke cleared, all that was left of the two spare female images were dark splotches on the glossy page. Lily glanced to either side of her, swallowed with trepidation, then faced forward and resumed smiling. But her eyes shone with fear. Peter felt a thrill to see it. Fear was the next thing to respect. He liked it… really liked it.

Running a possessive finger over her lovely face, he blew her a kiss, then placed the photo gently in the box with the other pieces of Lily. He closed it tight and hurried back through the old forgotten door, already late for the start of first period.

The last class of the day could not end fast enough. The moment Professor Slughorn dismissed the class, Lily was out the door like a snitch in the wind. She had learned exactly nothing today, her head too full of boys, their kisses, their fists, and their cryptic words to even hear the lectures, much less absorb the lessons.

What the hell did Sev even mean by 'too nice'? How was it possible to be 'too nice'?

"What does he know about being nice anyway?" she snarled to herself as she shrank her school bag down to a miniature and stuffed it in her pocket. "He wouldn't know about 'nice' if it bit him in the arse!"

She veered away from the tower and ducked out of a side door, once more seeking refuge from her troubles under the sky. Fearing to approach the lake – and risk a third encounter with Remus – she headed off down the lawn, skirting the forest on her way towards the Quidditch pitch. She considered going to visit Hagrid, but she just didn't feel equal to socializing today. Hopefully someone would have left the Quidditch shed unwarded. She needed a broom ride in the worst way. She wasn't the strongest flyer, but if gazing at the sky helped organize her mind, then soaring through the sky emptied it. She was sick of thinking.

"Shite!"

"Oh man, Hooch is going to skin you alive!"

Lily was pulled back from her thoughts by the lamentations of two second year Ravenclaws standing on the lawn ahead of her. Adrian Jenks had a broom propped against his shoulder, while Stanley Ingram stood broomless beside him, staring wretchedly into the thicket that demarcated the border of the Forbidden Forest.

"What's the trouble," Lily called as she hurried to their side, worried at their distress.

"Madam Hooch let us borrow brooms to practice for the Quidditch try outs," Jenks explained, "Ingram slipped off his broom at a weird angle, and it went flying off into the trees."

"Should we go in after it?" Ingram wondered, clearly torn between facing the danger of the forest and facing the danger of Madam Hooch where her equipment was concerned. "They told us to stay out, but its daylight. It can't be that dangerous…"

"No, absolutely not!" Lily interrupted sternly, giving each boy a serious look. "Even in daylight, there are plenty of dangers…"

She trailed off and her lips pursed uncertainly as they looked up at her, wide-eyed and pitiful, and felt a twinge on her heartstrings. She drew in a deep breath and blew it out of her nose, and she narrowed her eyes at the tree line.

You're too nice, Lil.

Too nice? There was no such thing.

"You guys stay here, I'll go get it."

"Alone?" Ingram squeaked, eyeing the forest like he was afraid it might bite him. "Is that a good idea?"

"Don't worry," Lily smiled, "Sixth years know a fair few more spells than second years. I'll be back in a flash. But you have to promise you'll be more careful, or next time you'll have to answer to Madam Hooch."

Both boys nodded emphatically, radiating gratitude that made Lily's chest glow as she advanced on the wall of vegetation. Sev was wrong about 'too nice'. It was never wrong to do what one could for others. She'd just show him how wrong he was.

Severus cocked his head at the busty blond wiggling up the walkway in his direction as he took a drag from his cigarette. He didn't particularly like smoking. It made his clothes smell, and he was pretty sure it was starting to turn his teeth yellow. But it pissed his father right off, and that was a good enough an excuse to justify nearly anything.

The girl he was currently watching was Chastity Burns, a seventh year Hufflepuff. Severus could only assume the name was meant to be ironic, since she'd been passed around Slytherin house more than a quaffle on the Quidditch pitch. Fortunately, for his purposes, she hadn't circulated much around the other houses – Slytherins knew how to keep what was theirs.

Severus wondered for a long, tempted moment, if he couldn't have talked his way into her knickers at least once. Chastity wasn't the quickest broom in the shed – in fact, she was more than just slow, she was outright dumb - and what she lacked in brains, she made up for in lips, legs, tits and ass. Severus may be a man in unrequited love… but he was still a man.

He sighed a little forlornly, flicked his cigarette butt at the ridiculous rose bushes that lined the walkway, and took out his wand.

"Accio book," he drawled in a bored tone, then held out his hand to catch the copy of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them as it flew out of Chastity's grasp.

"Hey! Severus Snape, that's mine! Give it back!" Chastity simpered, stamping her foot so that various parts of her jiggle in the most fascinating way.

Severus was struck with a nearly overwhelming urge to bang his head against the stone wall he was leaning against. He was way too selfless for his own good. He pushed away from it and held the book up, waving it teasingly at her.

"Why?" he asked snidely, flipping absently through the pages, "It's not like you've ever even cracked it."

"But it's still mine!" Chastity whined, and Severus snorted at the inadvertent admission. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw someone emerging from the building into the courtyard.

"If you want it, come get it," he taunted, then turned and took off in the direction of the door. He heard Chastity huff angrily (and ruefully imagined her cleavage heaving and swelling against her sweater), and she took off after him.

"Oy, watch it, Snivellus!" barked Sirius Black as Severus barreled past him, 'accidentally' dropping the book at his feet as he tore around the corner and vanished from sight.

Sirius glared irately after the Slytherin's retreating form, muttering ugly epithets under his breath. This had not been one of his better days – punched in the face, dragged around by the ear, scolded by the headmaster, chewed a new one by McGonagall, and James still wasn't speaking to him – all over a girl. Sirius had never worked so hard for a woman in his life. He sighed. Lily was beautiful and fascinating, but what a pain…

He bent to pick up the book that had been dropped at his feet. Just as he did, a phenomenal set of legs swayed into his field of vision. His eyes traveled upwards as he rose, and the view just kept getting better and better, until he stood looking down at a gorgeous blonde with a sweet, coy smile on her face.

"You got my book back for me," the girl informed him, batting her eyes. Sirius felt his eyebrows climb his forehead. "Thanks."

"The pleasure is mine, I assure you," he told her. "Snape can be such a troll."

"A total troll," she giggled, linking her hands behind her back and thrusting her chest out at him. "So why don't you walk me back to my dormitory? You can protect me if he comes back."

Sirius felt the corner of his mouth tug upwards in a nearly silly grin as he fell in beside her. He had a long moment's passing thought of Lily's shining red hair and snapping green eyes. Then his mind filled up with the luscious curves in front of him, and he admitted to himself that maybe he didn't strictly need to horn in on James' territory quite as much as he'd first thought...

"I'm Sirius" he told the blond as she latched onto his arm. "What's your name, love?"

"Chastity," she giggled, giving him a heated look through her lashes.

Sirius gave her a predatory grin in return. "I'll just bet it is."

"Merlin's bloody beard, I can't believe that actually worked…" Severus muttered darkly, scowling after the retreating pair of horny teens from where he stood peering around the corner of the corridor. Some people really were too naïve to live.

Still, it had worked out just as he'd hoped, even if it did put a foul taste in his mouth to treat Sirius Black. Well, so be it. For Lily, he would endure it.

One idiot down, three idiots to go.

TBC

Note: Whew, that one was a little complicated – but just two more chapters to go! Hope you are enjoying the story! This is my first Marauder fic, any comments or critique are most welcome!

Please feed my muse! If it doesn't get a well balanced diet of reviews, it subsists on vodka and Doritos! Help! Review!