AN: Here's the next chapter, on time and everything. :) Enjoy!

Chapter Ten:

Lily was on her way to McGonagall's office after dinner with Savanna and Mary at her side. She had promised her friends that she would tell the professor what else she was missing in case someone tried to frame her for another crime she didn't do. She was passing the tapestry of the gardening giants on the second floor when she first heard the shouting.

"What's that?" She asked, straining to hear what the voices were saying.

"I don't know." Savanna said.

"It sounds like a fight." Mary said. "Let's go find it."

"We're going to tell McGonagall about Lily's missing things." Savanna said.

"We can do that later." Lily said. "Let's go see what going on. Maybe someone needs our help." Savanna sighed, but followed her friends to the adjacent corridor. Just as Lily stepped out from behind the wall, a jet of orange light shot past her, missing her face by an inch. Mary reached out and pulled her back.

"Oi!" She shouted. "What's going on here?"

The people stopped fighting and looked around to see who had entered the corridor. Lily wasn't even a little surprised to see Sirius and James standing with their wands out. Remus was also there, his wand out, but not raised. At the other end of the corridor was Charles Avery and Severus, both of who had their wands out.

"One of you morons almost hit Lily!" Mary said. "Now stop acting like idiots and put your wands away."

"What are you doing?" Lily asked, not looking at anyone except Severus. "They're not worth getting into trouble over."

"We're not going to get caught." Severus said, avoiding eye contact.

"You were actually." Mary said. "We could here you from the first floor."

"You could not." James said.

"Yes I could." Mary lied, crossing her arms over her chest. "Anyways, McGonagall's office is in the next corridor."

"We're busy." Avery said, looking at the three girls and sneering. "Why don't the three of you run along now?"

"Don't talk to them like that!" James shouted.

Lily was confused. He hadn't said anything offensive. His tone was patronizing, sure, but he didn't actually say anything mean.

"Shut your mouth, Potter." Severus snapped, still looking at the ground and moving to put his wand back in his pocket.

"Don't back down now, Snape." Avery said, elbowing him in the side. "Just because she's here."

"I'm not!" Severus said.

"Then get your wand back out!"

"I think we've made our point." He said, pulling his wand out anyway.

"What's going on here?" Lily asked, still looking at Severus.

"Yes, why don't you tell her, Snivellus? Tell her why we're dueling." Sirius sneered. "Tell her what your little friend said. What you said."

"Shut up." Severus shouted, then he pointed his wand at Sirius. He shouted a spell and jet of light hit Sirius square in the chest, knocking him off his feet. He sprawled on the ground and groaned.

"You bloody prat!" James yelled, whirling on Severus. James' full body bind hit him and he fell back onto the floor as well. "You alright, mate?" James asked, walking over to Sirius and reaching out his hand to help him up.

"Expelliarmus!"

Lily turned her head just in time to see Remus catch Avery's wand.

"Did you just try to attack me while my back was turned?" James asked, looking outraged. "Give him his wand back, Remus." He said, pulling up the sleeve of his robe.

"No."

"Remus," James said. "I can't hex him if he doesn't have his wand on him."

"No." He sounded angry, but he wasn't glaring at James. "No, I'm not giving him his wand back. We've finished fighting. Lily's right, they're not worth it."

Lily opened her mouth to say that she had been talking to Severus, but Avery started talking first. "You weren't even doing anything. You were just standing there, watching."

"He doesn't have to fight if he doesn't want to." James said. Suddenly there was a horrible retching sound. Sirius was leaning against the wall, clutching his stomach and vomiting all over the floor.

"That's disgusting." Mary said, putting a hand over her mouth. Avery laughed.

"Remus, give him his wand back." Lily said, taking her own wand out. She waved it at Severus, whose body bind curse broke and he quickly stood up, dusting off his robes off. "Both of you, get out of here before I find it necessary to go and find a professor." Severus looked up at her, surprised. "I'm serious."

Remus tossed Avery's wand back to him. The two Slytherins stood in the corridor for a moment longer. Then Avery eyed Lily's wand and seemed to do the math, two on three he would do but two on four, possibly six if Mary and Savanna joined in? He wasn't that thick. Severus followed him out of the corridor without saying anything to Lily.

As soon as they were gone, Lily spun round on her heel and started marching off.

"Evans!" James called after her. "Evans, hold on!" She didn't stop walking.

"Aren't you going to take Sirius to the hospital wing?" She asked, not looking over at him. "He's still puking."

"Remus and Savanna are taking him. I think Mary ran to the loo."

"She doesn't do well with sick people." Lily said.

"I'm sorry." James said. "About what you just saw."

"What?" Lily asked. She stopped walking and turned to face him. He turned towards her also.

"I said, I'm sorry."

"I heard you." Lily said.

"I know he's your friend, but if you heard what those two were saying, you would have hexed them too."

"I don't think I would have."

"I think you would ha-"

"I don't care what you think." She pushed her hair back and fought the urge to stomp her foot on the ground. "And why do you think you can just apologize and make everything better? I just walked in on you dueling my best friend! I watched you hex him, and taunt him and you think you can just apologize? That's not how it works!"

"Then what do you want me to do?" James asked, running a hand through his hair. "I don't want you to be upset with me, so I'm apologizing."

"It's a bit too late for that." Lily laughed humorlessly. "I'm already upset with you. You're always doing something stupid." She bit her lip and started walking away again. And again, he followed her. "You know what I want you to do, Potter?"

"No, tell me please." James said.

"I want you to leave me alone and I want you to leave Severus alone." James stopped walking for a second and looked honestly shocked. Lily didn't notice this of course, she was looking ahead.

"I don't want to leave you alone, Evans." He said, no longer sounding apologetic.

"I don't really care." Lily said. "That's what I want."

"You don't even know why I hexed him!" James sighed.

"You don't need a reason! Do you?" Lily asked, turning her head just long enough to glare at him. "You didn't have a reason with Benjy or Rabastan or Stephen. You just do whatever you want, because you can."

"That's not true!"

"Really, Potter? So you don't sneak round after lights out, simply because you know you won't get caught, or because you don't care if you get caught?"

"That's not why we're out after-"

"You don't act stupid in class just because you want everyone to think you're smart?"

"You know, I didn't do anything to you." James said. He stopped walking, and so did Lily. "If you want to yell at someone, go yell at Snivilus. I wasn't in the wrong just a few minutes ago. He was." James turned to walk away, but paused after taking a few steps and turned back round. "And he fired the first hex, just to let you know. It wasn't me or Sirius or even Avery. It was Snape."

"You probably drove-"

"I'm not going to stand here and listen to you act like a bloody hypocrite." James said, grabbing a fist full of his hair. "Because of course it's alright for him to hex me, but if I pull my wand on him- Ergh! You're thick, you know that? And it's going to get you hurt one day."

"Is that a threat?" Lily shouted.

"No." James sighed, his voice softening. "No, it's the truth."

"Severus is a good friend, and a much better person than you." Lily said to James' back. He was almost at the end of the corridor now, but she hadn't finished arguing with him yet. She was still angry, she still wanted to shout. He paused for a second, but then kept on walking.

James couldn't believe it. How could Lily be friends with someone as vile as Snape? She was nice to everyone, and she never spoke ill of anyone (except him, when she was shouting at him, but he was pretty sure he was the only exception.) Lily Evans was a good person though. And Snape hung round with people like Avery.

Avery had been laughing about the phrase. "The Death Eaters shall rise and those who oppose shall fall." He had said, and James had heard him say, that it was just another way to scare the Mudbloods. James had seen Severus nod, agreeing with the git, and that's when he had interrupted their pleasant conversation.

By the time anyone had pulled out their wands, James was seeing red, and, as he walked away from Lily, he was seeing red again. She stuck up for Snape all the time, she never let anyone say anything against him whether he was around or not. And he had heard the things Avery had said about Lily and others of her birth, and he had watched Snape just stand by, even agree with them. It made him angry that she went to such lengths to protect him, and that he didn't even stand up to his friends for her. He didn't stop Avery from calling her the M-word. But when James suggested that maybe Severus was at fault for the fight, Lily wouldn't even let him explain himself. It wasn't fair that Snape treated her like that. It wasn't fair that he got to be friends with her and he didn't even act like her friend.

He didn't understand how someone as bright as Lily could be so thick about something that was so obvious to everyone else. Her other friends didn't think to highly of Snape, they weren't blind when it came to how he treated her. He was sure they noticed that Lily and Snape were never actually seen together walking round the castle anymore. That hadn't happened since first year, maybe the beginning of second.

If she wasn't going to do anything about the way he treated her, he was.

oOoOo

The next week did not start out well for those living at Hogwarts. Monday morning lessons were canceled, Kerri Clarke had been rushed out of the Great Hall by a witch from the ministry, James received a terrifying letter, Lily was being harassed by people she thought were her friends, and Alice, who wasn't sorry, ended up with a week of detention.

Lessons were canceled for all of Monday. There was a notice on the bulletin board in the common room and all the prefects made sure that everyone knew before they left the Gryffindor tower. Nobody knew why classes were canceled, but nobody was complaining much either.

"That means I have till Wednesday to do that Divination essay." Sirius said, climbing out of the porthole with the other three Marauders.

"If you didn't do it for today, what makes you think you'll do it by Wednesday?" Remus asked. Sirius shrugged.

"I probably won't."

"It gives me more time to go over my Arithmancy homework." James said. "Between Quidditch practice and all the scouting we're doing, I barely finished it last night."

"We don't have to go out every night-"

"We need to finish the map." James said. "I'm not complaining. I finished my homework, it's just nice to have a day off."

"I wonder why we do." Peter said. "This never happens. They don't just cancel lessons."

"It is strange." Sirius said. "But any day that I don't have to go to Divination is a good day in my book."

"Oh good." Carlee said, yawning widely. "I was up till midnight doing that stupid Divination essay. I'm going back to bed."

"Me too." Mary said, lacing her arm through Carlee's and turning back towards the stairs.

"You can't." Dorcas Meadows said, she was the prefect who had just told the girls that lessons were canceled for the day.

"Why not?" Lily asked. She was fairly tired herself. With all the stresses of the weekend, plus homework it was actually a wonder that she had found the energy to get out of bed at all this morning.

"Dumbledore wants everyone to go down to the Great Hall, I think he has an announcement to make."

"What kind of announcement?" Savanna asked.

"Maybe they caught whoever hung that thing up." Mary said. "Or he wants to inform us that the ministry finally declared an Albus Dumbledore day and it's going to be a school holiday as well. All we have to do is eat chocolate frogs until everyone in the school has one of his cards."

"I don't think that's it." Dorcas said with a smile. "But I'm going to keep my fingers crossed."

"Me too." Mary yawned. "Though hopefully we can wait until later to eat the chocolate frogs. I don't really like to eat chocolate this early in the morning. It gives me a stomach ache."

"Well," Savanna said. "Let's head down and see what he wants."

"You don't think that it's anything bad, do you?" Lily asked. "I mean, classes are canceled."

"I told you," Mary sighed. "It's Dumbledore day."

"Right." Lily said, rolling her eyes. "Dumbledore day."

Kerri Clarke was a seventh year Ravenclaw and played keeper for their Quidditch team. She was sitting with her friends in the Great Hall when a woman in dark blue ministry robes came up and tapped her on the shoulder. The woman had thick gray hair pulled into a neat bun and her lips were painted dark red and pursed, making it look as though she was perpetually displeased.

"Can I have a word with you outside?" The ministry witch asked her. She began walking towards the oak door before Kerri could answer her.

Kerrie looked at her friends who shrugged and then she hopped off the bench and followed the woman out into the Entrance Hall.

"What is this about?" Kerri asked, looking at the woman's odd little frog broach that was pinned on the collar of her robes. She wasn't worried at all. She was thinking about how her breakfast was getting colder and colder the longer she was out here. She was thinking about the homework she wouldn't have to rush through during lunch today because now it wasn't due until Thursday.

"Is your mother's name, Clancy Clarke?" The woman asked, pulling out a slip of parchment from her pocket and unfolding it.

"Yes." Kerri said. "Do you know her? She organizes Quidditch games and stuff."

"Yes." The woman said. "I know. And your father, his name is Harold Clarke?" Kerri nodded. She folded the paper back up and replaced it in her pocket. She clasped her hands together and looked Kerri in the eye. "My name is Ivory Jones, I work at the ministry. I find homes for orphaned children within the magical community."

"What are you doing here?" Kerri asked.

"Dear," Ivory Jones paused. "Your father passed away earlier this morning." She said, placing a hand on Kerri's shoulder.

"No." Kerri said, shaking her head. "My dad's not- he can't be-"

"I'm terribly sorry dear, but I'm afraid he is."

"But why are you here?" Kerri said, trying to get her thoughts straight. There had to be some sort of mix up. Her dad couldn't be dead. Why was this woman here? Shouldn't her mother be here, should she be the one to tell her this awful news?

"I came to pick you up." Ivory said. "Your mother is in the hospital and she wants to see you."

"What do you mean she's in the hospital?" Kerri said, taking a step back. She gripped the sides of her robes and bit the tip of her tongue. "She's fine. I got a letter from her yesterday."

"There was an attack at the ministry." Ivory said. "The healers will explain more when we get to St. Mungo's, but we have to leave quickly."

"Why?"

Ivory sighed. "Because, Kerri. I'm afraid she doesn't have much time."

Dumbledore stood behind his owl podium and looked out at everyone in the room. "There had been an attack." He said, pausing to let his words sink in. "It occurred at the ministry late last night. It was an unusual attack, there were no Raiders there, there were no hexes fired, instead a deadly poison was released into one of the rooms that a group of men and woman were in. Most of the people have not died." He said, hoping to reassure them. "And if you are sitting in here, you should know that none of your family members are in any immediate danger."

There was a screeching noise and a few owls started to come into the room. "Unfortunately, that doesn't mean that they weren't affected by the poison." He watched with a heavy heart as owls stopped in front of students, giving them letters that none of them should have to read. "If the poison did not prove fatal to those in the room, it made them extremely sick. Those of you who have family members who are currently in St. Mungo's will all get to leave the school to visit them. You do, however, have to wait until the ministry has deemed it safe." He saw an owl swoop down and land in front of James. He took the letter and then left it unopened on the table in front of him. He knew what was in it and Dumbledore couldn't help but feel guilty. He should be doing more to stop the raiders, he might have been able to prevent this.

"I wanted to tell you this myself before the Prophet arrived. I want you all to be kind to each other today, because this is a difficult time for everyone and we must stay united." He stepped down from the podium, not knowing what else there was to say.

James grabbed his letter and stormed out of the Great Hall as soon as Dumbledore was finished with his speech.

He had been worried about this. He had been terrified that something was going to happen to his mum now that she was working higher up in the ministry. Professor Jewell had tried to tell him that nothing would happen, but she had been wrong. Something had happened and James was terrified to open the letter. He knew she wasn't dead, if she was, he wouldn't be here right now, Dumbledore had said as much. For some reason, that wasn't much comfort to him.

His mum was older, she couldn't handle getting sick as well as she used to.

With shaking hands, James tore open the envelope and pulled out the thick, yellow, ministry parchment.

Dear James Potter,

It is my deepest regret to have to inform you that last night, while attending a meeting, your father was exposed to a poisonous substance and has been taken to St. Mungo's for immediate treatment.

We hope that he will make a full and speedy recovery, Unfortunately, we do not have any further information at present.

His dad? His dad was in the hospital now? What in the world had he been doing in the ministry?

oOoOo

Despite it being both a pretty solemn day and Dumbledore's request, people still found it necessary to harass Lily. It had somehow got out that Lily's badge had been found beneath the parchment in the sixth floor and now everyone had to comment on it. The Slytherins thought the idea that Lily had hung up the parchment was hilarious. The Hufflepuffs might actually believe that she had hung it up and the Ravenclaws were split half and half.

Most of her own house backed her. They knew she was innocent, otherwise McGonagall would have done something about it, and told the others that she was innocent. But people wanted to believe what they wanted to believe, and Lily was an easy scapegoat for those who wanted to believe that she was guilty.

She was doing her best to ignore it, she knew she was innocent and she didn't really care too much about what other people thought about her. Well, she cared less about what others thought about her than the usual thirteen-year-old girl.

"I don't like this." Carlee said, after telling off a Ravenclaw prefect. "They can't really think you did it, can they?"

"Obviously they can." Lily said, dropping her gaze to the floor as a group of Hufflepuffs walked by, whispering about her and not even trying to avert their eyes.

"They're thick." Mary said. "All of them."

"That's the twelfth time that you've said that." Lily said.

"It's true. I'll say it again too. They're thick. All of them."

The girls were going back to their dormitory now. They had tried to go to the library, but had to leave after about ten minutes because people kept coming up and asking Lily why she did it.

When they reached the Gryffindor tower, Savanna greeted them at the porthole.

"Have you seen Alice?" She asked.

"No." Lily said. "She didn't want to go to the library with us."

"Look what she left on the table this morning at breakfast." Savanna said, pulling out a piece of parchment from her robes. "I didn't mean to read it but…"

"Oh my…" Carlee said. "You don't think…"

"I hope not." Savanna said.

Some girl named Kerri had lost her parents this morning, Alice's mum was in the hospital and her father didn't want her to leave the school until the Healers had said that whatever her mother had wasn't contagious and no one was telling her anything. She was stuck at school with no information about her mother and she was expected to be satisfied? She mentally berated her father for being so worrisome. Other children had gone home, they weren't stuck in the school, worrying about their mums and wondering what was going on.

She was pacing back and forth in a deserted corridor, needing to be alone for a while, when she heard a sound that she really couldn't deal with. Not on top of everything else she had to deal with that day.

"Did you hear about Kerri's mum?" Clair's voice floated down the corridor as she and two of her friends walked around the corner. "She didn't make it either. It's all very tragic isn't it? I mean, they rushed Kerri out to see her, and then what? She had to watch her own mum die."

Alice turned her back on them and started stalking off in the opposite direction. She really didn't want them to notice her. And for once it wasn't because she was afraid of what they would say, or angry about what they were saying about her, it was because she honestly didn't think she could handle it. If she was afraid of anything, she was afraid of what she would do if Clair said anything to her.

She heard one of the other girls whisper something and knew it didn't matter anymore. She had been spotted.

"Alice? Is that you?" Clair called out. "Don't run away, I don't bite."

"Not now, Pitchfield." Alice said, fighting the urge to turn round and hex all of them.

"Pitchfield?" Clair laughed. "I didn't know we were on a last name basis. Do you really think that little of me? You can't even call me by my first name, Fortescue?" She laughed. "I was going to give you my sympathies. About your mother. But if you can't even call me by my na-"

"SHUT UP!" Alice shouted, spinning round and marching back over to Clair. "Shut up!" Clair was shocked, her mouth was still open and she was staring at Alice with wide eyes. "I do think a contempt of you. And you know something, it had absolutely nothing to do with your blood status, or my blood status. I think you're a low-life because you're a bully who likes to pick on me to make yourself feel better or- or- whatever! And I don't know why you think you're so much better than me, because you are worse than some of the pure blood elitists who actually think all the things that you say I think!" She clenched her fist around the handle of her wand and kept shouting at the stunned girl.

"You call me names, you put me down, you make me feel awful and you have the gall to make out that you have the moral high ground here? Like you're not doing anything wrong? My mum is in the hospital with some deadly disease that has already killed five witches and wizards and I don't have any way of knowing if she's going to be all right. I do not need you to come in here and make me even more upset."

Alice took a deep breath and closed her eyes, trying to calm herself down.

"Wow." Clair said after a moment, when the initial shock had worn off. "I didn't know you were so… angry."

"Angry?" Alice asked, snapping her eyes open. "Clair, are you serious? Do you not remember the things you say to me all the time?"

"I never say anything that's not true." She said, flipping her hair over her shoulder. "I can't believe that you just accused me of coming over here just to make you upset. I also don't know why you think you can get away with lying. I know that you think you're better than me because you're a Pure-blo-"

Alice had heard enough. Without thinking of the consequences, without thinking much at all really, Alice Fortescue, the small, polite, friendly second year, whipped out her wand and hexed Clair. She had mixed a couple different hexes together in her haste, so the effect was not something that Alice had meant to do.

Clair's face turned bright blue and her hair started falling out in clumps.

"WHAT DID YOU DO?" Clair shouted, catching a tuft of her hair. Alice brought her hands up to her face and covered her mouth, trying to keep herself from smiling.

"Alice?" Professor Flitwick walked around the corner and into the corridor. He took in the scene in front of him and then looked between Clair and Alice. "What's going on here?"

"She hexed me!" Clair shouted. "For no reason at all, she just attacked me!"

"Clam down, Clair. I'm sure everything is going to be just fine." He turned to one of Clair's friends. "Why don't you take her down to the hospital wing and see what Madam Pomfrey can do for her."

"Yes, Professor." The girl said. Then both of the girls had to drag Clair out of the corridor while she tried to shield her face from anyone they might run into on the way.

"Alice?" He turned to the only girl left in the corridor. "What happened?"

"I'd be lying if I said I was sorry, Professor." Alice sighed. "She's- it's just- I don't think I'm better than her because of my blood status!" She said quickly.

"So you found it necessary to hex her?" He asked, raising his eyebrows.

"No." She put her wand back in her pocked. "She keeps telling everyone that that's how I think. And she says other stuff too, like how my hair is weird and my teeth are too big. She's just mean." She started picking at the edge of her robe. "I suppose I took it a bit too far. I know I shouldn't have hexed her."

"I wish you would have told me about this earlier, Alice." Professor Flitwick said. "We do not allow bullying at Hogwarts." Alice nodded, thinking of everything people were saying to Lily, of Rabastan and Avery and everything they had done this year. "We also don't allow our pupils to hex each other. I'm afraid I'm going to have to give you a week of detention."

"Yes, Professor." Alice said.

"Alice," The professor said, changing his expression from stern to concerned. "I hope your mother gets better."

She tried to smile, but suddenly felt like crying. She had used up all her anger and now she was just worried. "Thank you."

AN: Please leave a review to tell me hw I'm doing, what you like, what you don't like. I like reviews. A lot.