I didn't notice it until a few days ago, but the first chapter of this story used Christopher Adler's original name of Ethan Chambers. As of now, I've gone back a changed it, but in case any one is confused, the Ethan Chambers in the first chapter is Christopher Adler, and not the Ethan Lily and Albus speak to. Sorry for any confusion. It was a terrible mistake.
X
"I don't understand how these little cuts and bruises get here," Hugo commented. His voice sounded distant and detached, but James knew he was just focused on healing the many cuts across James' head and arms.
"I can show you if you'd like." James replied. Rose narrowed her eyes at James but Hugo let out a soft laugh. As he continued to apply muggle bandages to James' open wounds, James flinched away from him, but Hugo continued nonetheless. As he finished, he moved to Edward sitting beside James and Rose neared the three.
"I could only get a hold of seven brooms." Rose explained as she peered down at her cousin. "You'll need to make some adjustments to your original list."
"Well, we've only picked six so far." Edward answered and Rose only stared at the two men.
"Including yourselves?" Rose asked.
"Yes." James answered and Hugo let out a laugh. Edward pulled back from him, and he and James peered at him. "What was that?"
"I'm a Healer and even I know that's a terrible idea." He answered frankly and Rose laughed while the two older men stared at the siblings.
"Why is it so terrible?" Edward asked as Hugo finished with their smaller, less serious wounds.
"Because you're not that fantastic of a flyer." Hugo stepped back from the two and Rose stepped towards them. Edward narrowed his eyes at Hugo, and though the statement was true, Edward resented it all the same. "Besides, you're both pretty badly beaten. You really should take a few weeks to rest."
"A few weeks?" James replied. "Are you barking mad? Do you the slightest idea how much can happen in a few weeks?"
"Death?" Hugo responded and James turned away from Hugo's reasonable thinking to face Rose's instead. "At least promise me you'll attempt to rest at some point in the near future."
"Fine." Edward and James grumbled in agreement to satisfy him, but Hugo knew not to really expect much from the two. He quickly left the room to continue seeing the other wounded witches and wizards, leaving Rose alone to plan their future attacks.
"Have we heard anything back from the spies?" Edward asked curiously as he peered up at Rose. She shook her head as she met his gaze.
"Nothing yet." She answered. "I doubt it's easy to get a message out of there, though. I'm sure we'll hear something eventually."
"What if they've been found?" James asked.
"Then there's nothing we can do about that." Rose answered sharply as she turned back to her papers. She kept track of all the things James would've never thought of keeping track of, and as a result, they were far more organized than James originally thought. As she continued to go over the list of men who had accompanied James and Edward on their last attack, she crossed out the names of the ones who had been killed or lost.
When she had time she sought out their friends and family to give them the news, knowing that everything was easier to know what had happened instead of wondering forever. As such, a visit from Rose was never something people looked forward to. It almost always was bad news.
"He would be in a prison if that happened." Edward said, as though the thought was supposed to bring hope.
"Or he could've been killed immediately and we'd have no way of knowing." Rose snapped as she turned to Edward, her eyes narrowed. HE knew she wasn't angry at him but at the situation they were constantly in.
"He would've tried to get a message, Rose." Edward replied.
"It wouldn't have gotten through." She answered before she looked to her list of people again. "Who are you taking with you to attack the prison?"
X
As the day of the attack neared, Lily found she could not as easily give into Chris' physical desires as she could before. With the thought of witnessing possible serious harm being done to her brother, Lily could not focus on Chris. She could hardly focus on him when other thoughts weren't haunting her mind. During those times, however, she knew the perfect distraction. Unfortunately that distraction was of no help to her now.
"What's the matter, love?" Chris tried to whisper softly into her ear as he gently pulled her back to his body, but Lily sat up on the edge of his bed and pulled the straps of her nightgown back up to her shoulders.
"I'm distracted, Chris." Lily answered simply. "You want me in battle, and I need to focus to do so."
"You didn't need to focus so intently when we first fell in love." Chris responded. His words almost sounded as though he was concerned, but his tone destroyed any possibility of that being the case. Chris wanted what he wanted, and Lily was not in the mood to give it to him.
"I was smitten by you." Lily lied easily, though the mere thought was certainly enough to make her sick. "And this is more important than any direct action I was involved with a year ago. I don't want to become distracted there by thoughts of you."
Chris almost smiled at her. She was almost as good at spinning hollow words as he was. She certainly was better at seeing through them than he. With that, Chris nodded and moved to sit behind her. He pressed his lips to the back of her neck after sweeping her long dark locks over her shoulder. "Very well, then. Perhaps you shouldn't stay here until after the attack, either."
"Perhaps." Lily repeated as she turned to him. She let him place a kiss on her lips before she rose to her feet. She gathered her thin cloak and tied it around her shoulders before she looked to Chris again.
"Good night." He told her. She knew he thought he sounded sincere but just like every other thing he says throughout the day, he means it only when it brings a benefit to him. Without looking back at him, Lily left the bedchamber and started to make her way towards her private room on the second floor.
She hated the way the floors creaked, and the noise seemed to amplify in the middle of the night. Without the sun's natural light, everything in the large mansion seemed a lot darker than she remembered. Even the furniture of the rooms she passed through seemed to carry a haunting presence that they lacked in the daylight. Finally, she reached the stairwell and the second floor corridor, before she stopped when a man's figure stepped into her path. Immediately, she pulled her cloak around her body to conceal her barely dressed figure, and as she recognized Ethan's face, she did not let down her guard.
"Out late?" He asked as he held his single candlestick between them.
"Why does it matter to you?" Lily responded with narrowed eyes. She did not like the overly friendly way which Ethan stared at her. Even his smile seemed as though he thought of her as a friend of ally, but Lily was not so easily fooled. The only problem was how genuine it felt to her. Against her instincts, Lily was very distrustful of Ethan.
"It doesn't." He answered simply. "I'm only out for a walk. I can't sleep."
"Good for you, then." Lily commented before she stepped around him and tried to continue down the corridor.
"I hope you won't be so nervous in a few days." Ethan called to her and she paused before she faced him. "After all, we'll all need to be at our best."
"What are you implying?" Lily spoke forcefully and Ethan only shook his head. He had started to respond to her, but stopped when a woman approached the pair. She had frozen at the sight of Lily and her pale cheeks had quickly flushed red. Lily turned to Ethan as she waited for the woman to continue past them.
She knew Chris had summoned her for his night's entertainment. She had never been under the foolish impression that he truly loved her and only her. Perhaps he possessed some inkling of love, but Lily suspected the majority of it was self love. After a few moments passed and the woman had not left their side Lily turned to her.
"He's expecting you now. I suggest you hurry before he calls someone else." Lily warned with as friendly a tone as possible. She knew she sounded upset and jealous, but she hardly cared. The woman only nodded two quick nods before she turned and hurried away.
"You know about his other women?"
"Do I look like a fool to you?" Lily replied sharply as she eyed Ethan.
"You're dressed in a night gown and it's freezing, so I suppose you do, just a little."
Lily turned away from him and continued down the corridor without even wanting to respond to his comment.
"I'm only kidding, Lily." He called to her, but she ignored him and kept going. She could faintly hear his laughter, but she ignored it as best she could as she reached the door to her private room. She quickly locked the door behind her as she tightened the cloak around her body to better block out the cold stiff air of the dark mansion.
In the back of her mind, she often compared Christopher Adler's choice in living arrangements to that of Malfoy Manor. Of course, Lily knew the Malfoys had nothing to do with the new self imposed government Chris wanted for the wizarding world, but she wondered how the buildings could feel and look so similar. She wanted to wander about Draco and Astoria Malfoy. She hadn't seen them in several years, but she did her best not to let them come to the forefront of her mind.
They had been just children when the Ministry first started to show its weaknesses and incompetence. Of course, Christopher Adler had been just a child then as well, but his father thought of himself as a visionary and Chris quickly followed in his footsteps. Lily was far too young to remember, but she recalled conversations with James perhaps a few years later. Everyone had though the murder of Alexander Adler would mark the end of his visions for the future, but Chris, with the help of his father's most trusted associates, had continued what his father had started in a much quieter manner than his father.
Eventually, Chris hunted down his father's killers. That had been when Scorpius moved to live with the Potters. He never knew about what his parents had done, and Harry and Ginny Weasley, as well as Ron and Hermione Granger, had always been aware that one day the young boy would ask.
He didn't have to, though. He knew the truth, more or less. He didn't have the details, but the details wouldn't change the truth. Instead, Scorpius accepted his new living arrangements for what they were. Almost as though they never existed, Scorpius never saw his parents again. News of their death had never come, and Scorpius assumed their bodies had simply never been found. He didn't want to think of all the things Chris had done to them.
Lily had not wanted to think of it, and yet she had anyway. She could not remember the last time she had cried, but as the tears had forced themselves passed her eyes, she felt no need to stop them. The floor was cold against her legs as she fell down against her bed. She wasn't convinced that the fate of Draco and Astoria, unknown for years, was the only cause for her tears. Part of her sudden breakdown was James and the new position she'd found herself in.
She had never imagined how far up the ranks she and Albus would climb when they chose the Division over the revolutionary. Becoming one of the chosen few to carry out a kill on her own brother had never been something she had braced herself to endure. Now that it had had happened, Lily doubted her strength that had yet to falter until that moment.
