The months passed by and before Scorpius knew it, it was already October. He was studying hard in the library, the teachers were just as tough, if not tougher, on schoolwork then they were when his father had been a student there. Not surprising as Hogwarts was quite famous, more so because of Harry Potter, and they had a standard to uphold. He didn't mind it, he liked studying because he learned new things each day, things that he would be able to use in the real world once he graduated…of course it was far away but a boy could dream couldn't he?
He had also been hearing talks about Lily, normally he wouldn't listen to them Hogwarts was always talking about the Potter-Weasley family. Whether it was which one was the cutest, the most handsome, to even their abilities, comparing them to their parents. Of course no one paid any attention to Scorpius' family, it was as though they didn't want to think about the Malfoy offspring; it was fine by Scorpius as he wanted to stay as inconspicuous as possible. However he had heard some startling whispers when he pass by the corridor concerning Lily, he noticed that from the third week onwards it had progressed from Lily struggling with schoolwork shooting down straight to Lily getting detentions because she wasn't doing her homework at all. That surprised Scorpius, sure first-year work was a bit hard since they wanted you to get in the rhythm of things, but surely it wasn't that hard that it wasn't doable?
One time he heard some Hufflepuff and Gryffindor talk that Lily had lashed out against a teacher, apparently the teacher kept asking why she didn't do her Charms homework when Lily yelled at him and told him that she didn't do it because she was too tired. That had cost her a detention and ten points from Hufflepuff, some were saying that she was even doing this to garner attention as she wasn't exactly in the spotlight with her cousin and two brothers constantly doing something amazing such as the Quidditch match recently against Ravenclaw and Gryffindor where Ravenclaw was flattened due to James Potter scoring a lot of goals, and Albus catching the snitch just before the Ravenclaw seeker could.
Scorpius wondered about all of this, was Lily really doing all of this just to get some attention on her? It sounded pretty extreme if that was the case. Surely she's gotten enough attention already being the only daughter of Ginny and Harry Potter? Perhaps not more then her brother, but still she would have gotten some attention being the only Potter family to actually be in Hufflepuff, in fact Scorpius thought she would have a throng of fans at her beck and call…okay perhaps that was a little bit excessive, but still she should have some friends.
However he shook his head and concentrated on his essay, he didn't have time to let his mind wander around on problems that he didn't have any concern in, 'Yeah right…admit it Scorpius you are concerned for her,' his brain told him sighing knowing that it was right. Although the Potter-Weasley family were the 'natural' enemy of the Malfoy it still didn't mean that Scorpius couldn't care about Lily. It was a mystery for him to solve, secretly of course, and if he did manage to solve it then he would keep it to himself no matter what it was about. He then groaned as he threw his quill away, how in Merlin's beard was he to concentrate while a thousand thoughts buzzed around his head? He got up wanting to walk around the library a bit, that always calmed him down and let him refocus back on the task.
It was when he turned towards the spells section that he saw Lily there, she wasn't reading a book or anything like that, instead she was sleeping. Stacks of books were surrounding her, like an imaginary, wall and she was definitely sleeping. Scorpius couldn't really blame her, sometimes he found himself falling asleep while doing something in the library. It had that affect on students as Scorpius smiled and watched her for a while, he was about to turn away and go back to his desk when he heard Lily moaning, he frowned and turned back towards her. Her face now betrayed discomfort as she shifted left and right while murmuring something indiscernible.
"Lily?" Scorpius asked approaching the girl carefully, was she having a nightmare? He never saw anyone have a nightmare before, and he had never had one either, but it looked like she was having one, "Lily wake up."
"N-no d-don't…" Lily responded, "p-please d-don't…I'll be good…" Scorpius frowned more. What was she talking about? What was she even dreaming? "I-I'm sorry, I'll be g-good…please don't hurt me…" Lily continued to mumble, as her nightmare seems to be more vivid and scarier as she was now panting hard. Scorpius' eyes widened, who was hurting Lily? Did someone hurt her? He momentarily thought that her brothers was bullying her around, but that didn't seem possible since Albus told him that James was very protective of his sister and he exclaimed that he wished she was in Gryffindor rather then Hufflepuff.
The nightmare seemed to escalate as she was now whimpering more Scorpius deciding to intervene as he gingerly shook Lily's shoulder. Instantly her eyes flew opened and she slapped Scorpius hard out of reflex, "Ouch," Scorpius said softly feeling the stinging slap on his cheek as Lily's eyes focused back to reality before widening.
"Oh my god, oh my god I'm so s-sorry," Lily said her tone betraying fear as she curled up more, "I-I didn't m-mean to do that."
"It's fine," Scorpius said, "are you okay Lily? You seemed to have a nightmare?"
"I-I'm f-fine," Lily said, "it's n-nothing."
"Are you sure?" Scorpius asked, "Is someone…hurting you?" Lily's eyes widened more when she heard that as he nodded, "Yeah, you were muttering for someone to stop hurting you and stop doing something…look Lily, I'm not like my father was, I want to help you."
"You m-must ha-have heard w-wrong," Lily said, "n-no one's hurting m-me."
"Protecting the guy who did this to you won't do you any good, if anything it'll make things worse," Scorpius retorted. For a while Lily looked at Scorpius, like she was trying to decide whether or not to tell him what was going on, her mouth then opened and Scorpius thought that she was finally going to tell him. But then she shook her head looked down.
"N-no…I-I can't…they'll h-hurt me," Lily said softly shaking her head more, as tears ran down her face, "they'll hurt m-me if they f-find o-out."
"I promise Lily, they won't hurt you," Scorpius said, "look why don't you tell your brothers or cousins if not me, they're your family."
Lily shook her head again, "T-they have enough o-on their mind w-without worrying a-about m-m-me," she said, "I'll b-be a good girl…" she began rocking back and forth as her voice took a dreamy tone, "they won't h-hurt me i-if I'm a good girl."
"Lily," Scorpius whispered brushing back a bit of her hair, he wondered if the bruises and broken arm that he had witnessed a month ago were the result of whatever Lily wasn't telling him. He couldn't think of a possible reason of what could cause something like this, Lily was spiralling towards destruction if she kept up, it was like she had been broken…no more exact it was like her spirit had been broken by something, or someone. He just wished that he would be able to help her, also now that she was awake Scorpius could see that she had bags under her eyes, it was also red like it was from crying though that could have been just now, but she looked even paler and thinner then before alarming the boy, the situation becoming more dire. If Madam Pomfrey saw her now no doubt she would be writing to Lily's parents immediately whether or not Lily wanted it or not.
"I'm s-so tired S-Scorpius," Lily said making Scorpius' head snapped up, this was the first time she ever said her name, however her tone was still in a dreamy state. She probably wasn't even aware what she was saying, "I-I can't sleep at night…" she informed him.
"So you sleep here in the library?" Scorpius asked, that would make sense as the library was quiet and no one would come to disturb her if they found her like this. He reached out to wipe a tear off her cheek, but the moment his hand touched it she flinched and shuffled away with fear in her eyes, almost like on reflex knocking some books in the process, "It's okay," he said with an almost sad voice…he really wished that he could help her somehow.
"P-please go away S-Scorpius…I'm so t-tired," Lily said and her voice did sound tired.
"Please let me help you Lily," Scorpius said, "your grades are dropping, I've heard talks that you're lashing out at the teachers. At this rate you won't pass anything," he said hoping that would snap her back to reality. But it seemed to only make things worse as Lily smiled sadly.
"That's okay…I'm n-n-not as g-good as my br-brothers anyways, not even a-as good as Rosie," she said, "t-that's what she s-said…t-that everyone d-doesn't care about me."
"Then that person is no friend of yours," Scorpius said appaled that someone would say that to Lily, no true friend would ever say that to another, "you should stay away from her if that's what she's saying to you."
Lily seemed to be only half-listening as she continued to look at the various books scattered around her, her fingers brushing against the covers. She then looked at Scorpius with a glint of madness in her before beginning to crawl towards him, "Scorpius," she said in a flirting tone making the boy very uncomfortable, "do y-you want t-to play w-with me?" she asked curiously.
"W-what kind of game?" Scorpius asked not liking her tone one bit. Instead of answering however Lily then jumped into Scorpius' embrace as she smiled sweetly at him, too sweet for his liking, "I-I don't think I like this game Lily," Scorpius said not wanting to push her away for fear of injuring her, but at the same time he needed to get her off of him. But she continued to caress his arms in an unusual way while giggling softly as she went lower, his eyes widening all thoughts of being gentle went out the window as he pushed Lily back and ran several steps backwards, he saw her sprawled on the ground sobbing and curling up.
His heart beating wildly he ran away from the scene not because he detested her, but because he was unsure of what had just happened. Did Lily just try and flirt with him? That was completely out of line, and that scared him a lot, "Damn it what the hell is going on?" he asked himself as he went back to his desk and grabbed his things. When he went back to check up on Lily, but she seemed to have disappeared, and not even a search of the library yielded any result. Calming himself down he decided to try and talk to her the next time they meet, no matter how many times it took he will get the truth out of her, he wondered if he was caring because she was a Potter and therefore wanted to have the Malfoy on good terms with them, or it was because he genuinely cared for her? "But I can't be falling in love with her…right?" he asked himself though he was unsure of the answer.
Time flew again, and the Christmas holiday was soon upon them. It had been so far an eventful time; ever since that incident in the library Scorpius had made it his personal mission to find the truth from Lily. Most would have said that he was being too nosy, after all it was her own problems that she had to deal with, however Scorpius had a vague feeling that this was the kind of problem that she wouldn't be able to deal with alone and that she needed help in order to resolve it. He tried to find her during his spare time, but he was hampered by the fact that he didn't know what her schedule was like, and no one was willing to help him. Indeed there were several times where Jacob had threatened him, a few times the burly Hufflepuff had beaten him before promptly telling him to stay out of 'their business'.
Scorpius expected resistance from Amara, and Jacob. They seemed to be the only two Hufflepuff that Lily was ever around whenever he saw her; it was a constant element that Scorpius had to deal with. However it wasn't just those two that he had to avoid, but also Lily's older brother James; it came to no little surprise that everyone would be whispering that Scorpius had been 'stalking' Lily intending to do her harm, perhaps even instigated by Amara. Naturally James came to have a little 'chat' with Scorpius, which involved smashing him onto the wall one night with no one around, "Listen to me you filthy prat," he growled, "I don't know what you intend to do with my sister, and I'm pretty damn sure it's nothing good knowing your family's track record. If I hear that you're hurting her, or even intimidating her you can bet on it that I'll find you and make sure you never intimidate anyone else ever again."
Scorpius made no move to defend himself, James wasn't going to believe him that someone else was hurting Lily, though he did ask a question, "Have you ever seen your sister lately?" he asked trying to sound non-threatening as possible.
James' eyes narrowed, "What's it to you? Are you threatening her?"
"No, no, just wondering if you seen her you would probably be a little suspicious about some things…like I have," Scorpius said hoping that his hint would at least alert James that something was wrong, and that he would check up on Lily at least.
"Ha! You know that Lily and me are in different houses, and I rarely see her anyways. Besides Amara, sweet girl, says that she's doing just fine and has plenty of friends," James said as Scorpius had to prevent himself from rolling his eyes.
"And heard any rumours about your sister lately?" Scorpius asked, surely someone as popular as James could not turn a deaf ear to rumours about his sister's behaviour. Even he would have heard something at least.
"As you said, rumours," James said though a flicker of worry did pass through his eyes, so he had heard them and he was starting to get suspicious, "anyways you got your warning. Stay. Away. From. My. Sister," and with that James walked away. Coincidentally enough around the same time all rumours about Lily's behaviour or failing grades seemed to stop, almost like on command, Scorpius wondered if Amara, or Jacob had anything to do with that. But that didn't stop the students from whispering to one another about Lily's decline, it was amazing what people said when they thought there was no one eavesdropping and Scorpius was quite good at remaining undetected.
However he had been unable to talk directly to Lily, the few times he did manage to do so she seemed to look away from Scorpius and continue to talk to herself. Saying that she wasn't good enough to be a Potter, or that her brothers didn't care about her, she also seemed to be more and more tired until Scorpius was sure that she needed a good two day's worth of rest before regaining her strength; perhaps her nightmares were escalating to the point that she couldn't sleep? He asked her if she would like to tell Madam Pomfrey about it, but she would only shake her head and act so scared that Scorpius had to drop the idea completely before she calmed down. It seemed she was scared about anyone finding out about her situation making things a lot worse, if Lily didn't tell anyone about her situation then there was no way that anyone else would know.
Right now he was walking towards his common room after dinner, he had work to do and he didn't have time hanging around with the others. They wouldn't miss him anyways, he didn't have a lot of friends, only a few and even then they weren't really best friends. He was walking down a corridor when he heard someone sobbing, he stopped wondering if he had misheard it, there were plenty of ghosts here in Hogwarts and not all of them had happy endings…perhaps it was Myrtle crying again, that ghostly girl never seemed to be happy. However he had not misheard it as he heard it again making him curious about who it was, probably some girl who had her heart broken by a boy, he had seen plenty of that going around especially with the third years upwards. His father had said that falling in love in any year lower then sixth year was inviting disaster, but didn't Harry Potter and Ginny Weasley fell in love sometime during their fourth or fifth year? Perhaps they were just special people, and under special circumstances.
Expecting to be comforting a broken-hearted girl his own heart nearly stopped when he saw that it was Lily who was crying. He thought he saw her at dinner tonight, but she must have slipped past him while he was busy eating making him wonder just what exactly had she been doing if she wasn't eating at the Great Hall? She was now curled up against the wall, and whatever happened must have happened recently as Scorpius looked around her and him to make sure there weren't going to be any surprises before walking towars her. "Lily, Lily what's wrong?" he asked crouching next to her.
Lily looked at Scorpius, her eyes red and full of fear, "S-Scorpius w-what are you d-doing here? I-Is dinner done?" she asked.
"Not for a while, I just sneaked out so I can do some homework," Scorpius said, "what happened to you? Did someone hurt you?" he asked.
"N-nothing happened," Lily said wiping the tears away as Scorpius' eyes widened when he saw that one of Lily's cheek was flaming red, suspiciously in the shape of a handprint, "i-it's nothing Scorpius."
"Did someone hurt you?" Scorpius asked again, "You need to tell me Lily, whoever this person he, or she has no right to do this to you, or anyone. Was it Amara? Or was it Jacob?"
Lily shook her head as she sobbed again, "I c-can't, I can't," she said, "they'll hurt me more if I told anyone. And even if I do…my life is over, no one will even want to look at me anymore."
"No you're wrong!" Scorpius said a little louder then he wanted to be making Lily jump in fear, "s-sorry about that. But you're wrong Lily, your life won't be over if you tell me who it is, if you tell Headmaster Darren who it is, you know why? Because the person who is doing this to you will never hurt you again, you'll be safe once again and you can stand proud knowing that you've overcome this adversity."
Lily looked at him and for the first time Scorpius could have sworn that there was a little fire sparked inside of her, like she was seriously contemplating telling the truth, however that seemed to dim with a second but she nodded, "S-Scorpius…d-do you really think so? W-will I be free?"
"Yeah, because I think your dad would make sure no one ever hurts you again," Scorpius said with confidence, what kind of parent would allow the perpetrator to even be in the same school as their children if this was happening to them?
"Ok then…I'll tell you," Lily said with a shaky breath as she curled up against Scorpius and closed her eyes, "it all began the second week I was at Hogwarts. Until that day everything was fine, I was really looking forward to going to the same school as my parents…" Lily then began to recount her traumatising time at school. It had first began when Amara had approached her one night after everyone else had been asleep, at first they had just simply talked about what to expect in a Hogwarts education and Lily enjoyed the talks since Amara was knowledgeable about a lot of things. But then Amara talked about an 'initiation' just for the Hufflepuff female first years, something that was very secretive, naturally Lily had never heard of such a thing but went along anyways as Amara sat next to Lily and then did the unthinkable, she leaned forward and kissed Lily lightly.
To say that Lily was shocked would be an understatement as she immediately retracted and looked at Amara in shock, but the fifth year merely said it was a tradition to do this. Lily protested and moved to go to her room, threatening that she would tell their head of house if Amara tried that ever again. However Amara turned violent at that point and slapped Lily hard, saying that she wasn't as good as her brother were and she should stop being a pampered princess. From then on things grew progressively worse, the abuse grew worse at an alarming rate to the point that Lily could have sworn she had lost her innocence long ago. When Scorpius inquired if she had meant what he thought she meant she gave a sad smile and shook her head, it had only reached up to touching and groping, but she was sure that one of these days it would be taken too far making Scorpius shudder with fear and horror.
But Amara would not be her only tormentor, soon Jacob also joined in and he was much worse then Amara. Whereas Amara would abuse her sexually and emotionally, Jacob abused her physically and he was responsible for most of the bruises and broken arms that had been inflicted upon her during the year. Scorpius gasped shocked that not one, but two students would do such a thing to Lily? He asked her why and she said that she didn't know, they never told her why only telling her that they didn't like the looks of her and simply decided to 'put her in her place'.
By the time Lily had finished telling her story Scorpius could only feel a seething anger burning inside of him, he felt like hexing the two of them into oblivion and damn what the consequences would be. But he knew such a thing would be foolish, he would undoubtedly be beaten back due to them being two years older then him, and even if he did managed to do so he would only be put on detention for attacking fellow students and nothing would stop Jacob and Amara from abusing Lily even further. The course of action was clear on what he needed to do looking at Lily, "Lily, I think that we need to talk to Headmaster Darren-"
"N-no he c-can't know!" Lily exclaimed her eyes bulging out of her socket in fear, "H-he'll tell everyone."
"I doubt he'll tell anyone about something as serious as this," Scorpius said, "we can also talk to your dad as well."
"I don't want them to know either…I'm…I'm too ashamed of myself," Lily said on the verge of tears once again.
"You have nothing to be ashamed about," Scorpius said, "think about it Lily. If we don't tell anyone then they'll continue to abuse you and degrade you more, and like you said it'll escalate until something…bad happens," not wanting to say the word as he feared it would make Lily even more hysterical, "also think about the other girls, surely you're not the only one right?"
"S-sometimes Amara says s-she has o-other girls…I-I've never met them…" Lily said, "T-the Hufflepuffs a-are afraid of Amara and Jacob…I don't know why."
"Then let's save them too," Scorpius said, "you want to help them don't you?" he asked as Lily looked at Scorpius and seemed to be having an internal fight with herself as she rocked back and forth. Scorpius' mind, while she was having this, was working hard trying to think up of ways to explain what kind of power did these two have over the Hufflepuff? Prefects? A good choice, but it wouldn't explain why the older students ignored this completely, unless several of them were in on this but from what Lily was saying it seemed only Jacob and Amara were her tormentors…perhaps the school faculty can get to the bottom of this.
"Alright," Lily finally said making Scorpius turn to her, "a-alright…I-I'll go to Professor Darren," Scorpius beamed at Lily.
"That's the way," Scorpius said hoping that with this Lily would be safe, 'Merlin's beard…it hasn't even been a full year yet and I'm already neck deep in something like this,' Scorpius thought to himself as he looked at Lily and saw that if she was really confident about herself, she would have looked quite cute. 'Woah there Scorpius, don't take advantage of the situation, you'll be no better then those two creeps' his mind said as Scorpius agreed with it. Whatever feeling he had for Lily right now would have to wait until he could get Lily to Headmaster Darren.