Summary: Lily hates James. James loves Lily. Lily has a secret which James has found out, and now she's afraid he'll tell. Begins with an excerpt from Order of the Phoenix, no longer in Harry's POV, but through Lily and James. Rated M for adult themes in later chapters and some language.

Disclaimer: I own nothing that you may in any way recognize. All of the characters save for a few of my own imagination belong to J.K. Rowling.

Chapter 7: Nightmares

January and the cold was as awful as ever. The one thing that Lily was thankful for was that at the very least, during Christmas break, she had managed to get some sleep as her dreams had subsided.

Unfortunately, not three nights after being back at Hogwarts, Lily was having them again. Homework hadn't really started piling up yet, and Lily now was going to get out the dream books at the library and try to figure out what her subconscious was telling her.

First she tried the easy symbols, beginning with the most simple, the moon. This, however, might not have been the best plan as the moon could mean everything from wanting your crush to serenade you to having mildew in your house (though that was only one very obscure occurrence that was documented in Germanic times).

Then she tried strange creatures. Nothing much, aside from rather obscure references to pagan religions in Egypt, and plain old fear of that type of creature. Lily wanted to bang her head against the table in frustration.

Just as she was about to throw Dream Symbols and What They May or May Not Hold in Store for You, across the room, she heard voices. The library was becoming quite the place to eavesdrop.

"Maybe we shouldn't go tonight," someone whispered. It was a male voice.

"We can't not go. Think about poor Remus all by himself in that rickety old shack."

"But Sirius, didn't you say that Snape knew. What we're doing, it's illegal." 'Sirius?' Lily thought. And then she nailed the other voice—Peter Pettigrew.

"We're just playing with old Snivellus. He wants a show, he'll get a show alright."

"I thought James said—,"

"James is getting a little soft on us now. Trying to "change" for Evans and all that. This'll get him right back on track."

"What if Snape gets hurt?"

"He'll be fine. He'll get a scare, and we'll be there to take on Remus if things get out of hand. Cheer up Peter, we get to sneak out tonight. Maybe we can use the map to find that cute Ravenclaw girl you've got such a crush on. You can sneak in her room to give her a snog—," their voices faded as they left the library.

Lily snapped her book shut. Damn her eavesdropping, now she had to go find Severus and warn him about what Potter's lot was up to.

---

Lily hadn't seen Severus Snape very much expect in passing him in the halls. They hadn't spoken since the night he had called her a mudblood. Briefly, as Lily searched she felt bereaved of the time they hadn't had together. He had always been her best mate up until that one moment.

Lily spent an hour looking for him, and was just about to give up. She decided to check the entranceway into Hogwarts for the fourth time, this time resolving to stay there for at least thirty minutes in the hopes of heading him off.

Lily felt an odd shiver go down her spine as she entered the front hall. She shook it off as being due to the irrevocable cold. She wasn't wearing her warming robes tonight.

The door to Hogwarts was open. Lily stared at it, and in that moment she felt that Hogwarts was suddenly in danger and unsafe. She also knew that Severus had gone outside.

It was almost lights out, and Lily knew that going out into the cold was to tempt frostbite. But she'd seen all of the nasty things the Marauders had done to Severus, and to others, and the tone Sirius had made it seem like it would be his worst trick yet. Drawing her less than warm robes tightly about her, Lily struck up her resolve and went outside.

Though it had been extraordinarily cold, it had not snowed it the last few weeks. Frost and old snow were tamped down into a crust on the earth.

To Lily's luck, there were clear cut and recent muddy footprints across the frosted surface of the ground which was littered with old shoemarks from student's walks across the grounds for classes. These seemed clearer, and after Lily light the tip of her wand with a spell they gained even more clarity. The marks also didn't lead across the paths students had been taking regularly to class, but up over the hill towards the lake.

It was now, as she heard a chime tolling out that it was midnight, that Lily wondered whether the plan had been to simply lock Snape out of the castle. Cursing the cold, Lily followed the footprints. She wondered where on earth he had planned to go as they rounded the Lake away from the Dark Forest. At first she had been certain they would end up in the Dark Forest, at which point, Lily would probably be forced to give up and go to McGonagall.

However, they led her to—the whomping willow? 'Why the bloody hell, would anyone go near that thing.' Lily thought.

The tree had been rooted the same year that Lily had began her schooling at Hogwarts. Many foolhardy sixth and seventh years and the occasional first year had tried to brave the branches despite Dumbledore's warning. This of course led to broken arms, broken legs, and pretty much broken limbs all around. And now Sev was going to just walk right up to it. Hah.

That was when Lily spotted him, a hulking mass of dark cloak. She called out to him, but he didn't hear her. Severus walked up to the tree, still standing out the range of the branches. He was holding something, a spare bit of parchment, and his own lit wand. It took him a while because it was dark, but eventually he found a particularly long stick and inched a little closer to the willow.

At the base of the tree there was a small knothole, and not much to look at, but Sev was diligently prodding at it. Suddenly he hit it spot on, and out of the knot hole appeared a man sized opening within the trunk of the tree. The entire tree froze up and the limbs of the willow ceased to move even for the wind. Without hesitating Snape went into the tunnel that was leading from the trunk of the tree.

Lily took off running after him, knowing that the charm on the tree wouldn't last long.

The inside of the tree trunk was pitch black. Lily crept through the tunnel that wound slowly don into the earth, touching the rough and slightly damp walls to feel her way though. A deep sense of foreboding began to creep into her heart. The only sounds she could hear were the scraping of her own footsteps on the tamped down earth, and inhale and exhale of her breath. At one point she managed to make her voice work. "Sev?" she asked, but there was no answer, only the hollow echo sound of the wood reverberating her word back to her.

After winding around for a while in the dark, Lily found herself at a dead end. She stopped, feeling her heartbeat quicken. Somewhere in the distance she heard a scratching noise and she began to feel nauseaus in the pit of her stomach. This all felt very familiar to her in a very bad way. She remembered Peter's words, "What if Snape gets hurt?" and felt her mind spin a bit. A part of her knew she should turn back and the other part of herself—the noble Gryffindor half knew that she needed to find Sev and get him out too.

She placed her hands in front of her feeling the rough hewn wood of the dead end. After tracing her hands up and down it, she found a doorknob. Slowly she opened it.

She was inside an extremely gloomy room. To her left was a staircase cracked with age and beset with deep welts from being used as a scratching post by some type of animal. There were two other doors in the room: one across from her that led into darkness that Lily perceived to be another room, and to her right a door that looked as if it might be a doorway outside. One dust covered window stood next to the door. Only one pane and the shard of another remained intact.

On the floor lay Severus Snape, crumbled into a heap of black slytherin robes and long greasy hair.

Lily moved forward all at once. She knelt down beside him and grabbed his shoulder. She heard a low moan from him as she whispered, "Severus? Are you alright?"

Before he could answer she heard the scratching noise that she had heard from the tunnel much more amplified. Lily looked up and around her. The scratching noise became more clear until she realized that it was the distinct sound of claws against the wood grain on the floor. And animal was panting in the darkness of the room across the hall.

Feeling her heartbeat pound in her throat, Lily grabbed Severus's arm and tried to pull him up. He was too heavy for her to lift. She leaned down and whispered in a panicked voice, "Sev you have got to stand," when she heard the creak of a door opening.

She looked up and forward. In the room across from her the hulk of a brown and gray beast with yellow eyes. It was wolf-like, with a long snout. Its yellow eyes glinted at her. Slowly it stood up on it's hind legs and howled up into the ceiling of the shack. Lily stood frozen. She had learned about these creatures during her third year. It was a werewolf.

Lily tried in vain to pull Severus up, but just as she got his torso off of the floor, the beast settled onto all fours and charged at her.

She screamed as it came at her and took her down. She felt a searing pain in her ankle through her robes and then her head cracked sharply against the floor. Everything went suddenly and completely black.

---

It was dark, that was all that Lily knew. It was dark, and she had her eyes open, but she honestly couldn't see. She felt panic bubble up in her throat, but she refused to scream.

Her head hurt horribly. There was a full moon in the window. Small scratching sounds were issuing from somewhere behind her.

She swallowed, her mouth felt like it was filled with cotton. Where was Sev?How long had she been lying on the floor?

She didn't remember how long she'd been out, a few moments? A few days?

Her ankle was searing. She looked down at it, and felt faint for a few moments. It was cut wide open and bleeding freely, the white of the bone quite visible. She tried to gain a grip, she tried to think. She buried her face in her hands- by the time they found her… She barely concealed a whimper. No, she would not cry, she could not cry.

The scratching got louder and louder, and then there was a crash, not at all in the distance. Lily stood up quickly; she bit back a cry of pain as her ankle burned. She felt blood run into her shoe.

She looked out the same rough-hewn floor, and out towards the creaky door. It was open.

She heard more scratching, and looked up. Outside the door hung the full moon, tinged with silver, and rising on its hackles in front of the doorway was a full grown werewolf.

It was tall and burly and fanged. It towered over her, saliva dripping from its teeth, yellow eyes gleaming from the doorway, as it stood on its hind legs.

Lily felt her mouth open, and she felt, despite herself, a large and loud scream ripped from her throat as it began to advance through the doorway. A string of saliva hung from it's jowels and it's yellow eyes glared intelligently upon her. Lily began to shake. Outside of the door, she could see the full moon, a blinding halo of ethereal light, and she shut her eyes against it as she felt another wave of nausea and a wave of déjà vu all at once: her nightmares. This was her nightmares all gathered into one.

Finding her resolve, she raised her wand and yelled, "Expelliarmus," and hit it square in the nose. Feeling adrenaline shoot through her, she ran at the door and slammed it shut. There was a weak looking wooden bar used to lock it, and she threw it knowing it wouldn't be enough.

The wind was howling. It had grown quite cold in the shack. Lily's arms were covered in scratches, she realized, and a deep ache had settled into her ankle. But she'd managed to bar the door. There was the sound of rough scratching. Lily felt the blood drain from her face. She tried to think- but her mind wasn't working.

And then the door burst open, and there was the sound of snarling. Lily shut her eyes feeling her mind shut down in panic. "Let it be quick, oh Merlin," she thought waiting for the feel of jaws snapping her in two.

When none came, but the howling grew louder, from the sound of pain, Lily opened her eyes. It had been backed into a wall, and a great silver animal stood, blocking it with it's antlers, leaving the door wide open.

A great white stag with long twelve point horns had come to her rescue. It pawed the earth and tossed its head. It rested one dark hazel eye upon Lily, and she felt her breath catch in her throat. The look had been intelligent, longing, and protective all rolled into one. This stag whatever whoever it was, would be her savior.

Lily heard another howl, and she turned to see the werewolf's yellow eyes were wild and upon her. It snarled madly and lunged. The stag threw itself into its path, in front of Lily. The hulking hairy creature tore at it with its claws and tore a gash into the stag's shoulder. The stag reared up onto its hind legs and clubbed back the werewolf even as the blood trickled down his foreleg.

"NO!" she screamed, and she moved to help it. Instantly she regretted it as her head spun from the sudden pain in her leg. The stag turned and rested one eye on her briefly before throwing its antlers into the wolf once more and knocking it soundly into the wall.

A rat raced into the room and towards the werewolf. As the wolf lumbered up from its second smack into the wall, the rat scurried around and in between the wolf's deadly paws, confusing it. The wolf whined, and its eyes rolled in its head as he tried to catch the rat. Each time it swiped, the hooked claws barely missed the wormlike tail of the rat.

A black dog followed soon after, and Lily began to wonder if she was dreaming. She leaned heavily against the wall and began to inch her way to the door. In the teeth of the dog's mouth was Severus Snape's robe. He was standing, stooped and looking as battered as Lily felt, but at least he could walk. The dog dragged him towards Lily and released him. The dog bit at Lily's wrist, urging her along. She stared at it, and then looked back at the stag. It had corned the werewolf and it looked closer to subduing it. She swallowed, feeling as if all she had known had split apart at the seams. She grabbed onto the large dog for support, and allowed it to lead her and the groggy Snape out of the shack, back into the tunnel, and towards Hogwarts grounds.

As soon as they had cleared the Whomping Willow, Lily promptly fainted from a mixture of relief, pain, and the fear from her worst nightmare coming true.