Silver Lining

Chapter 11: Where Did All the Time Go?

The Easter term seemed to pass by much faster than the winter term and soon enough it was April and the holiday buzz was in the air. Lillie couldn't remember much of what had happened, it had been a very busy term and she could only remember three things distinctly.

The first of these was the exams that they had sat in February. Lillie had done quite well in these four O grades ad three E grades. She remembered the weeks leading up to them were full of confusion and hectic revision from the first years while everyone else assured them that they weren't important.

The second thing she could remember were the two Quidditch matches that Ravenclaw had played that term, the first one against Hufflepuff had been a quick match (only a minute long) which Ravenclaw won 150-0. The second match had been against and was much better, from a Ravenclaw's point of view anyway. Ravenclaw had thrashed Slytherin 680-0 in a brutal two hour humiliation for the Slytherins. By the end of it Lillie's throat was sore from cheering at the 53 goals that Ravenclaw had scored, including one where the Ravenclaw keeper soared across the length of the pitch holding the quaffle and threw it over the head of the Slytherin keeper and right into the centre hoop and another when one of the beaters hit a bludger into the quaffle and sent it soaring right through the keeper's legs.

The last thing she could remember was the one thing she wished she could forget. It had happened two weeks before the end of term. Lillie had caught Teddy snogging a second year Gryffindor in a corridor near the Charms classrooms. She didn't know why she felt annoyed about this, she didn't like Teddy, not in that sense anyway and she didn't know who this girl was but even so, she found that whenever the though of them popped into her head she would become moody for a few minutes. She hadn't spoken to Teddy since then either, she wasn't avoiding him deliberately, it was just that whenever she saw him she would be reminded of that kiss and would subsequently become grumpy with the whole world.

"Hey Lil'," came a voice from beside her bringing her out of her reverie. She looked around and saw Gill's face and ginger hair a foot away from hers.

"Hey," Lillie said, yawning. It was dinner on the Wednesday before the end of term and Lillie was unimaginably tired. "What's up? Why are you so… bouncy?"

"My mum said yes. You can come and stay at our place for the Easter holidays and so can Parvati, Etta, Jenny and everyone else."

"Oh, that's great," said Lillie finally cottoning on to what Gill was talking about.

"Yeah and because it's my birthday next week, she said that we can have a kind of pool party too. I'm gonna invite loads of people so it should be great fun," jabbered Gill excitedly.

"Hold up, you have a pool?" asked Etta sitting herself down opposite Gill and Lillie, Gill nodded. "Oh my god, so jelly belly, right now," exclaimed Etta.

Lillie who was not really in the mood for 'girl talk' excused herself and got up to leave the Great Hall. When she reached the doors, however, her path was obstructed by none other than Professor Selwyn.

"Just the girl I was looking for," he said in his usual terrifying whisper.

"Hello, Professor Selwyn," said Lillie calmly.

"Shut up, girl. I have a message from Dulcia," he said handing Lillie a small envelope. Lillie took it and put it in her pocket.

"Thank you, Sir," she said, trying not to let her utter hatred for the man in front of her seep through into her words.

"I told you to be quiet," he said lowering his voice even further; Lillie had to fight very hard not to recoil. "I look forward to seeing you in tomorrow, I shall need a… volunteer," he finished, a terrifying, mirthless smile spreading across his face. He then pushed past her into the Great Hall. She stood there for a moment, too stunned to moved, after about ten seconds, she started to make her way slowly towards the stairs.

By the time she reached them, she was flanked by Chris and Teddy. She stopped for a moment and looked from one anxious face to the other then without a word made her way up the stairs, she heard the two boys follow in her wake. She sighed but kept on walking towards the Ravenclaw common room, still without a sound. As she reached the door to the common room, it was opened by a fourth year from the inside. Lillie let her pass but then carried on through before the door could close. She climbed the stairs to the dormitories and was about to push open the door to the girls' dormitory when she found her path obstructed by Teddy. Accepting the inevitable, Lillie turned to face the two boys.

"I'm fine, there's nothing to worry about," she said, knowing full-well that this would not satisfy either of them.

"What did he do?" asked Chris.

"He was passing on a letter from my great-aunt."

"What did it say?" asked Teddy.

"I don't know; I haven't opened it yet." Lillie looked at Teddy and Chris but both of them just stared at her. Once again she sighed and pulled the letter out of her pocket. She took out the piece of parchment and read aloud.

To my filthy great-niece,
I'm glad to discover that you are not returning for you holiday. I do, however, feel sorry for the poor girl with whom you are staying. I hope you have a torrid time.

Dulcia Fabiana Selwyn,

P.S. I hope you enjoy the return journey.

Lillie finished reading and looked up at the two boys.

"What does she mean 'I hope you enjoy the return journey'?" asked Chris looking between Teddy and Lillie.

"I don't know," said Teddy looking anxiously at Lillie. "Lillie, what does she mean? Is it a threat? Well, Lillie?"

"I don't know. Don't ask me, I don't know. Now if you'll please excuse me I want to go to bed," she said, pushing past Teddy and walking into her dormitory. Behind her she heard Chris and Teddy muttering worriedly. She walked over to her bed and grabbed her towel from the railing and got into the shower. The hot water was soothing and she stayed in the shower for about an hour; when she came out, she felt like a lot of the stress that she had been felling recently had been washed away.

Lillie did not sleep well that night, dreams involving Dulcia, Professor Selwyn and the Gryffindor second year from outside the Charms corridor meant that when she woke up the next day, she did not feel rested at all, but instead all the stress had returned. Lillie had hoped to be able to avoid Chris and Teddy for the next two days, but because Chris was in so many of her classes this proved to be impossible.

The last lesson on Thursday was Transfiguration and Lillie still had Professor Selwyn's words running through her head: I shall need a… volunteer. Lillie didn't know what this volunteer would have to do but she suspected that it wouldn't be anything fun, not for the volunteer, at any rate. She turned up early so as not to give Professor Selwyn an excuse to get angry with and waited apprehensively outside of the classroom. Soon enough the whole class was waiting silently for Professor Selwyn to show up. When he didn't, Mindy Bamforth tried the door but it was locked. They waited where they were for another fifteen minutes, when he still didn't show up, a few people began to leave. This broke the ice and a minute later, the corridor was empty, and Lillie's pounding heart was beating at a more normal pace once she realised that she wouldn't have to face Professor Selwyn again until after the holidays.

As they were walking back towards the common room Lillie saw Chris heading for her so she dodged into a girls' bathroom that she was passing and marched into one of the cubicles closing and locking the door behind her. She heard Chris call out her name but she ignored him. She wasn't sure why she was avoiding him, she wanted to be able to spill out her worries to someone, but when the opportunity came, she didn't want to.

A few seconds later she heard him walk away. She let herself out of the cubicle and examined herself in the mirror. She looked tired, her skin was paler than usual and she had shadows under her eyes. She did not look eleven. For that matter she didn't feel eleven either. She didn't think that any eleven year old should be scared of going home, but scared of being at school as well.

When Lillie finally returned to the common room, she found it empty, and she traipsed up to her dormitory and collapsed onto her bed in the far corner. She drew the hangings shut around her and fell fully-clothed into a deep dreamless sleep. When she awoke, the clock on the wall next to her bed told her that it was 7:30.

She was about to get up to go down to dinner when she saw the six sleeping figures of the other girls. How long had she been asleep? Where did all the time go? As quietly as she could, so as not to wake up the others, she picked up her towel and went to go have a shower. By the time she got back, Parvati and Jenny were up and about as well.

"Are you feeling better?" asked Jenny.

"What?" asked Lillie.

"When we came in last night you were already asleep, so we assumed you weren't feeling well," explained Jenny.

"Oh, right. I'm feeling fine, I was just tired last night, that was all." Jenny smiled at Lillie before going into the bathroom herself.

"I'm really looking forward to the holidays. Apparently Gill's house is really nice and she's invited so many people to her pool party thing, it should be so much fun," Parvati said excitedly.

Lillie nodded and Parvati followed Jenny into the bathroom. Lillie left the dormitory as other people started to stir and headed down to the Great Hall for breakfast. As it was so early, barely anyone was there and Lillie sat down alone at the very end of the Ravenclaw table. When she had finished, the room was almost fall. Lillie had seen Chris enter but he didn't come and sit next to her, instead, he sat with Richard at the Gryffindor table.

Friday morning was easy for Lillie; she had double Herbology followed by double Quidditch. After that she had the afternoon completely free, and during that time she planned on packing before the train left tomorrow morning.

Herbology was simple enough; Neville had them juice a plant with an unpronounceable name, whose sap could cure many minor poisons. In Quidditch, Professor Wood, made the advanced and intermediate groups do some difficult-looking drills under the watchful eye of Harriet Linky, a seventh year who planned on becoming a professional Quidditch player and the beginner's group played a match. Lillie played keeper, mainly because nobody else wanted to, and turned out to be surprisingly good.

That afternoon, packing did not take as long as she had expected and she found herself with a couple of hours free time and nothing much to do. She decided to go for a walk in the grounds. She had reached the common room when she was intercepted by Teddy. They had only spoken once in the past two weeks and that was on Wednesday when he had interrogated her about hers and professor Selwyn's conversation.

"Where are you going?" he asked casually, but Lillie could see that he was tensed up.

"For a walk," said Lillie simply. Teddy raised his eyebrows slightly and Lillie raised hers back. "I was packing, I finished and so I decided to go for walk," said Lillie.

"Where?"

"In the Grounds."

"Don't go near the for-,"

"I know, Teddy," interrupted Lillie, "I've been at Hogwarts for over seven months now."

"I'm sorry," said Teddy meekly, but when he next spoke Lillie could once again hear the conviction in his voice, "It's just that I worry for you. I know it's irritating, I do, a people used to, still do it to me and irritates the hell out of me but… I see now why they did it. It's natural; I can't help but worry about you."

Lillie stood in stunned silence watching Teddy, during his little speech his hair had gone red and it was slowly fading back to normal. Eventually she whispered, "I'm sorry, Teddy, I forgot." And it was true. She had forgotten. Over the past few months she had forgotten that Teddy was an orphan like herself. He was just less preoccupied by it; he was calm and led a perfectly good life, from now on Lillie would strive to do the same.

"It's fine," said Teddy, stepping forward and wrapping his arms around her shoulders pulling her in against his body. After about a minute Lillie pulled away, "Still going on a walk?" asked Teddy gently and Lillie nodded. "Can I come?" Once again Lillie nodded and together, they walked out of the door one of Teddy's arms still around Lillie's shoulders.

They walked for about half an hour or so, around the back of the castle where Lillie had never been before. They walked in comfortable silence, the afternoon sun warm on their faces. Eventually the came to a small cabin near the trees, Lillie had seen it a few times from the castle but she had never been near it and she had no idea what it actually was. There was smoke from the chimneys and a large shadow could be seen moving around through the pink flowery curtains. Teddy who evidently knew whoever lived here went up to the door and knocked loudly.

"Who eez eet?" came a heavily accented woman's voice from within.

"It's Teddy, Madame Maxime," said Teddy. "I came to visit Hagrid."

"Agreed is ill at ze moment, Teddy, but I will tell im you came, he will be so glad to eer eet. Eet az been getting lonely," replied Madame Maxime.

Teddy sighed and walked away from the hut with Lillie close behind him. "Who are Madame Maxime and Hagrid?" asked Lillie.

"Hagrid used to be groundskeeper and Care of Magical Creatures teacher. He's retired now, pushing on 80, he still lives there with his wife Madame Maxime," explained Teddy. "Hagrid is good friends with my godfather, that's how I met him. They mostly keep themselves to themselves, eighty's quite old for a giant and Hagrid-"

"A giant!" cried in Lillie, shock obvious in her voice.

"Keep your voice down," urged Teddy. "Anyway, he's only half-giant and Madame insists that she is 'big-boned."

After that they lapsed once more into silence and headed back up to the castle, passing along the way the marble tomb of Albus Percival Wolfric Brian Dumbledore, an old headmaster of Hogwarts and from what Lillie had read, a great man in general.

As they approached the castle again, they heard the bell ring signalling the end of lessons so Lillie and Teddy decided to go straight to dinner, they were first in and they crossed over to the Ravenclaw table and sat down. Soon enough, however, the hall was full of people bustling about, Lillie spotted Jenny and Parvati walk in together and was about to beckon them over when she was pushed aside. She looked at what had pushed her and blanched; straddling the bench where she had been sitting was the Gryffindor that Teddy had snogged. Lillie slid awkwardly down the bench away from Teddy and didn't stop until she hit something solid.

With the colour returning to her face because of the embarrassment she turned around and saw none other than Toby Rasbash, the sixth year prefect with whom she'd descended into The Chamber of Ravenclaw. She hadn't spoken to him since then and at the moment she didn't particularly want to.

"What the- Oh, hey… Lillie," he said awkwardly. "Long time no see. Err. How are you?"

Lillie opened her mouth trying to think of something to say but was saved by Jenny and Parvati who had finally reached her. "Erm, Lillie, can I talk to you?" asked Parvati hesitantly. Lillie turned to her relieved and nodded like there was no tomorrow before sliding back up the bench so she was as far away as possible from both Toby and the girl who was once again hanging off Teddy's face. Parvati and Jenny sat on either side of her perplexed at Lillie's antics.

"Is everything alright, Lillie?" asked Jenny, in her usual kind tone.

"Yeah it's just… I'll tell you later," said Lillie flatly. "What did you want to say Parti?" Lillie asked Parvati who smiled at the nickname.

"Oh yeah, Gill's present. You know how there are four of us staying at Gill's this holiday, us three and Etta. Well Jenny, Etta and I thought that it might be a good idea if instead of getting her four separate things; we all pool together and get her one really good present. Is that cool with you or have you already got her something?"

"You know I can't, but it sounds like a great plan," said Lillie encouragingly and Parvati's grin returned.

Half an hour later, Lillie, Parvati and Jenny were making their way out of the Great Hall. "So are you going to tell us what was happening when you arrived?" asked Jenny, looking questioningly at Lillie.

"Oh. It's not much. During the Christmas holidays a hippotiff-,"

"Hippogriff?" suggested Parvati.

"Yeah, a hippogriff broke into the common room, there was loads of other stuff in there too. Toby, that's his name, came downstairs to find me in the middle of all this mess and he thought that I'd done it. I told him I hadn't but he didn't believe me and said he would report me to Professor Flitwick if he caught me doing anything else," said Lillie, making it up as she went along. Jenny nodded understandingly and Parvati looked slightly surprised to hear about the hippogriff, but neither said anything sensing that it wasn't something that Lillie wanted to talk about.

That night they all stayed up late talking about the two-week holiday that started tomorrow. Samantha and Isa both promised that they would come to Gill's party and so they would all be seeing each other at some point. As it transpired, most of the Ravenclaws were going to Gill's party with the exception of the McDougal twins who were going back up to Findhorn. As well as this a lot of Hufflepuffs had been invited Victoire, Richard and a many other Gryffindors and only one Slytherin: a guy called Julian Jones (Jenny's twin brother and Gill's crush). All in all it was set to be a busy event.

The train back to London left at ten o'clock in the morning, and so most of the girls' dormitory was up before eight unpacking and repacking their bags, making sure they weren't forgetting anything. Lillie on the other hand stayed in bed until about nine, at which point she finally got up, had a quick shower, packed her towel and headed downstairs to grab a quick breakfast before she left.

When she finally headed out of the castle doors with the other girls, it was twenty-five past nine. The girls headed towards the path that led into Hogsmeade; lined up along the path were several carriages each one attached to two of the black skeletal winged-horse things like the one that had broken into Ravenclaw back in December. The other girls didn't seem to notice them and she was about to ask them about the thestrals, when she remembered that only people who had seen someone die could see them, so instead she just got into the carriage with the others and a few seconds later they were trundling down the path to Hogsmeade chatting merrily.

A couple of hours later, Lillie was sitting in a compartment inside the warm and comfortable train, which was lucky, because outside the sky had gone black and rain was hammering against the roof and windows. There hadn't been enough room in the compartment for all seven girls so Lillie had volunteered to go sit elsewhere. She had ended up in a compartment with Chris, Richard and the infamous Michael Bilding, whom she had never met, but had heard a lot about from Victoire. The three boys were discussing Quidditch and Lillie felt her head drooping to the side, by the time it landed on Richard's shoulder, she was fast asleep.

Lillie's eyes opened and she found herself on the floor of a strange room, it was made from dark grey, almost black stone and the shiny floor was covered in papers and splinters of wood. As her eyes grew accustomed to the light Lillie realised that the floor was not shiny, but covered in pieces of glass that Lillie assumed must have come from the window in the corner.

Next to the window was a door, Lillie headed towards it, but couldn't open it. She turned to the window and pushed aside the billowing white curtains. Lillie quickly withdrew from the edge of the window for outside, there was a sixty foot drop onto hard rock. More carefully this time she peered through the window. She appeared to be in a tower, on a lonely rock in the middle of the sea, there was a strong wind, which made both the threadbare curtains and Lillie's sleeveless knee-length night-dress flap. She looked down at the craggy rock below her and thought she saw movement but when she looked back she couldn't see anything.

She looked down at herself: her night-dress was dirty ripped and in places, there were droplets of what appeared to be blood. There seemed to be rope-burns and bruises on her arms as well. Lillie had no idea how she had ended up like this.

"Hello," said a small voice from behind Lillie. She whirled around, cutting her foot as she did so, standing behind her was a girl no older than nine. "I'm Anna," said the girl.

"Hello, Anna, I'm Lillie. Do you know where we are?" asked Lillie approaching the girl, who shook her head. Lillie opened her mouth to speak again when she heard the sound of a key in a lock. She turned around to face the door instinctively stepping in front of Anna as she did so. There was a loud click that reverberated through the silent room, neither Lillie nor Anna dared to breathe, ever so slowly, the door began to creak open…

The train gave a sudden jolt and Lillie jerked awake, her head coming away from Richard's shoulder before colliding painfully with it again. When she looked around, she realised that all three of the boys were staring at her with wide eyes. It was Michael that broke the silence, "Are you okay?"

Lillie considered him for a moment, she didn't know him and would rather just tell Chris and Richard, but he seemed nice enough and it would be rude to ignore him. "Yeah, I'm fine. Why, what happened?"

Richard spoke this time, "You were sleep-talking." Lillie raised her eyebrows slightly at this, Richard didn't seem to notice and kept speaking, "It was fine at first, but after a bit you started shaking and sweating and then moaning. It was a little scary to be honest."

Lillie swallowed, she didn't know what to say, she might have told Chris and Richard but with Michael there she couldn't, not that she didn't like him, but she'd only met him today. "Bad dream," she said feebly. With that she got up and left the compartment heading down to the bathroom at the end of the carriage.

The door was ajar and she slipped through, shutting it behind her. She looked at herself in the mirror, she was very pale and there was still sweat at her hairline and around the contours of her nose. She twisted the tap and cold water came gushing out, she splashed some onto her face and it seemed to wash away some of the worry she had felt since waking up. It had been just a dream, nothing more, nothing less. Lillie dried her face and looked back into the mirror, she was still pale but some of the colour was returning and everything else seemed alright. She left the bathroom and walked straight in to Chris who had clearly followed her out of the compartment.

"What happened?" he asked, trying and failing to sound casual.

"It was just a bad dream, Chris," said Lillie, getting impatient.

"Hell of a bad dream to make you…" Chris started saying but Lillie cut him off.

"Chris, have you never had a bad dream? I'm fine just a little shaken that's all." Lillie was not sure what had happened, a few moments ago, she had wanted to tell Chris and Richard everything, but now she was letting the opportunity pass by, no more than that, she was pushing it away. Maybe it was because she had convinced herself that nothing was wrong.

Chris opened his mouth to say something back but in the end decided to let it drop and turned around before heading back to the compartment. Lillie gave him a minute to cool off before heading back herself. When she got back the boys had started talking about Quidditch again and she didn't interrupt although Richard did give her a concerned look. Lillie took a book out of her bag at random and opened it to a page roughly a third of the way through, but she was only pretending to read. On top of still being shaken from her dream, she now felt bad for getting angry with Chris as well.

By the time they were approaching King's Cross a few hours later, the atmosphere in the compartment had relaxed and Lillie had joined the conversation which had changed from Quidditch, to Professor Wood and they were now on the topic of teachers in general.

"I think Dung, I mean Professor Fletcher's great," said Michael. "Lillie, you agree with me right?"

"He's good fun and he's nice and relaxed," conceded Lillie, "but when it comes to teaching, he's not great."

"Exactly!" said Chris.

"Alright. Fair enough. You know who completely creeps me out though, is Professor Selwyn," Lillie saw Chris and Richard tense up at this and they both glanced at her, Michael was oblivious to all this and ploughed on, "I don't even have him for Transfiguration, I've got Professor Hemmingway, but even so, he makes me cringe." He looked up at the others, clearly expecting a response, when he didn't get one he looked a little confused.

Luckily for Lillie, they pulled into the station at that moment; she grabbed her bags and hurried out of the compartment, calling something about finding the others over her shoulder. She reached the compartment where the other girls were just as the train pulled to a stop, they greeted her jovially, they had clearly enjoyed the journey much more than she had.

They got off the train onto the steamy platform, where Lillie said goodbye to Samantha and Isa who weren't going to stay at Gill's house, although they would be going to the birthday party next week.

"My parents told me that they would be waiting near the exit of the platform," said Gill leading the other four towards the exit of the platform, it was hard to see through all the steam but eventually they heard a cry of "Oi, Gill, over here!"

They headed towards the voice and through the steam Lillie could make out Jeremy and Sienna Marlon, Gill's older siblings, a young girl, identical to Gill who Lillie assumed was Gill's younger sister. Standing behind these three were two people who must be Gill's mum and dad. Her dad had short, black, greying hair and the same blue eyes as Gill, he had a very strong chin and he looked slightly haughty. Lillie could tell that Gill had inherited many more of her mother's features; they both had the same red-brown hair and they had very similar builds.

The man smiled, "Hey girls," he said, his voice was kind and gentle but Lillie could tell that he could be stern if needs must. "Because we live quite far away, we're going to have to floo back home. Have you all done it before?"

There was a positive murmur from four of the girls, Lillie on the other hand spoke nervously," I haven't."

"Not to worry," said Gill's father, "Gill will tell you about it. Now follow me, all of you, I don't want anyone getting lost." He then walked past the girls and led them towards and started leading them across the platform.

Lillie looked questioningly at Gill who nodded and came over to her. "Basically," she said, "you step in the fire, yes, fire," she said at the look on Lillie's face, "but don't worry you can't feel it. You step through into the fire, drop the floo powder and say the name of the place you want to go. But be careful, make sure you speak clearly."

'Flooing' turned out to be easy. Mrs Marlon went first, then Gill's little sister, Helena, and then Gill's brother and sister, than Jenny, Etta and Parvati went. Lillie stepped forward, glancing over her shoulder, Gill nodded encouragingly and, bracing herself, Lillie stepped into the flames.

The flames did not burn, as Lillie had been sure they would, the feeling was actually quite nice, like warm water and Lillie stood enjoying it for a bit. Then she grabbed a handful of powder from the jar in Mr Marlon's hands, it was dark grey and felt just like sand. Raising her hand she cried, uttering every syllable with the utmost care, "Marlon Residence!" and then she threw the powder into the flames.

Everything around her went bright green all of a sudden and in a split-second the faces of Gill and Mr Marlon were gone. Lillie felt like she was spinning round and round, even though she could feel her feet on the floor. A few seconds later, the green light died away and Lillie staggered forward into what she hoped was Gill's house.

When she had regained her composure, Lillie stood up and looked around the room. It was quite clearly a kitchen, but it was the biggest kitchen that Lillie had ever seen, there were many counters and cupboards an oven and many other things, milling around near where she was standing were the people who had come through earlier, Lillie went over and joined them. A few seconds later, Gill came through the fire and announced that Mr Marlon was about to send through the luggage and, sure enough, two minutes later there were seven suitcases in the room.

"Come on," said Gill excitedly grabbing her suitcase. The other four girls followed suit and then Gill lead the way upstairs to their rooms. The house was big and well-decorated. Their rooms were on the top floor (out of three), they each had their own one and Gill showed each girl in as she went forward. "Okay, Jenny, you're in this one and Etta you're across the hall," she said and the two girls split off from the small group. "Parvati you're in there opposite me and Lillie you're just a bit further."

Lillie opened the door to her room, it was big, bigger than any room she'd ever had at any rate, the walls were faded, so Lillie couldn't make out the pattern, as she approached it, however, she realised that it was adorned with lilies. She made a mental note to thank Gill for that later, but first of all, she had to unpack her stuff.

Dinner that night was quite a quiet affair mainly because the girls, Jeremy and Sienna were all to tired to talk much. Gill's mother was an excellent cook and they all went to bed that night feeling exceptionally full; Lillie was asleep the moment her head hit the soft pillow.

Lillie was woken up the next morning by a small tapping at the window, she got groggily up and headed over to it. Even though it was still quite early, it was already bright and Lillie saw a small, pale grey owl perched on the window ledge, she opened the window and it hopped inside sticking out its leg to which was tied a small roll of parchment. She untied it and the owl flew back out of the window.

Lillie watched it go curiously, when she could no longer make it out, she looked around, she saw the enormous pool below her and she thought she saw a rabbit or some other small creature running into the bushes at the end of the garden. She looked back down at the scroll in her hand. Who knew she was here? Well, a lot of people actually. But why were they writing to her already? She slowly began to unravel the parchment.

Hey Gill, it started and Lillie stopped reading, the letter had obviously been delivered to the wrong person. She got up and headed out of her room, she wasn't sure if Gill's room was to her left or to her right, she looked around but when she couldn't see anything she headed left and tried the first door she came to. Lillie was pretty sure that this wasn't Gill's room: it smelled of boy, there wasn't a single poster of Adam Irvine anywhere and the person on top of the covers looked distinctly like Gill's brother Jeremy wearing nothing but boxers. Jeremy began to stir and Lillie bolted out of the room and back the other way, not stopping till she reached the door to Gill's room. Lillie pushed open the door and this time she was satisfied that it was Gill's room for Gill herself was sitting cross-legged on the bed a book open on her knees.

"Hey, Lillie, what's up?" she asked looking up from her book. "Have you been running?"

Lillie, who was a little flustered, took a while to reply, "This came for you this morning, the owl came to my room instead of yours," she held up the letter. "I couldn't remember which room was yours and I accidentally walked into your brother's room," she finished.

Gill sat up a little straighter, "Please tell me he was wearing clothes," she said.

"Just about," said Lillie and Gill relaxed slightly.

"Can I see the letter?" she asked, Lillie nodded and handed over the little roll of parchment. Gill quickly scanned through it and her face fell.

"What is it?" asked Lillie tentatively.

"It's Julian, Julian Jones, you know, Jenny's twin, he says he can't come," said Gill, looking slightly crestfallen. Lillie, like everyone else except Julian Jones, knew about Gill's huge crush on Julian.

"Oh well, you'll see him again soon enough," said Lillie.

Gill brightened up at this and got off her bed, "Let's go down to breakfast."

"What time is it?" asked Lillie as they headed out the door.

"Who knows, mum will probably be up though and if she's not, I'm sure we could throw something together.

As Gill had predicted, her mother was up and about, she told them that Mr Marlon had gone to work already and then that she would start making breakfast once more people had come downstairs. Gill then took Lillie into the sitting room and sat down on one of the comfortable sofas.

"What does your dad do?" Lillie asked Gill curiously. She wanted to know what jobs people had in the wizarding world.

"He works in Gringotts, the wizarding bank in Diagon Alley," said Gill, matter of factly.

"So he's a banker?" asked Lillie, slightly disappointed, she was hoping for something much more, much more magical.

"Not really," said Gill and Lillie looked at her confused. "He works for the bank, not in it. I'm not really sure what he actually does, but sometimes he has to go abroad for ages, usually to really strange and remote places. When he comes back, he's normally been injured but will have some kind of treasure."

"That's more like it! I knew wizards would have more exciting jobs than muggles. My parents worked for the government, unbelievably boring stuff, I had no idea what they were talking about when they tried to explain them to me," said Lillie. "So what kind of places does your dad go?"

"Last time he left, he went to Madagascar, you know, down in Africa. He came back with a huge spike of some kind of white stone but he was in bed for about a week afterwards," said Gill.

Lillie, who was surprised at Gill's casual tone asked, "Don't you get really worried about him?"

"Not really," said Gill in the same casual tone. "He always turns out fine in the end."

Lillie still wasn't convinced, but she let the matter drop. "Do you ever get to go with him?"

"Sometimes, if it's not a dangerous place we can visit him, but we're not actually allowed to know specifically what he's doing," said Gill, and although she said it airily, Lillie could tell that Gill was annoyed by this.

At that moment they heard footsteps coming down the stairs and a moment later, Parvati came in, followed by Etta. "Where's Jenny?" asked Lillie.

"I think she's still in bed," replied Etta.

"I'll go get her and then we can have breakfast," said Gill heading up the stairs.

A few minutes later they were seated around the large table in the kitchen: Lillie, Gill, Parvati, Etta, Jenny, Mrs Marlon and Helena; Sienna and Jeremy were still in bed. Mrs Marlon had prepared an enormous cooked breakfast and in the middle of the table were several large platters of food: sausages, bacon, eggs, toast, jams, pancakes, waffles, and something that Lillie didn't recognise but everyone else seemed to love.

"So, girls, about the party next week, do we know roughly how many people are coming?" asked Mrs Marlon.

"About forty five in total," said Gill.

Her mother whistled slightly, "That's a lot of people. What kind of food? Where? What do you plan on doing? Come on Gill, we need to sort these things out."

"I think a kind of buffet will do," said Gill before turning to the others and asking, "What do you guys think?"

"How about a barbecue?" suggested Parvati.

Then the planning began, the seven of them discussed everything from food to flowers and Lillie felt a bit overwhelmed. By the end of breakfast, a plan had been conceived, although Lillie wasn't entirely sure what it was and she left the room feeling a little bit dazed.

At long last the evening before the party arrived, the girls had gone to bed feeling slightly apprehensive: it had been raining for the past two days, and it didn't look like it was about to stop anytime soon. As these weren't ideal conditions for an outdoor barbecue, Gill and her mother had made emergency plans and it was looking increasingly likely that they were going to have to use those plans.

Fortunately, however, when she woke up, Lillie saw the sun shining through the crack in the curtains and she heard Gill's excited cry next door, muffled by the walls. Soon enough, they were all, with the exception of Jeremy, seated around the table eating breakfast.

No one spoke much; there was a tension in the air which seemed to have come out of nowhere, Lillie hadn't realised how much people got worked up over something like a party, she wasn't used to the feeling having never organised a party before. Hoping that the atmosphere would improve once guests started arriving, Lillie headed back upstairs to have a shower, passing a groggy looking Jeremy on the way.

She opened the door to her room, and heard a cry of, "Silencio!" from her bed. Taken aback, she turned to face the castor; standing at the foot of her bed was Professor Selwyn. Lillie tried to scream, but no sound came out and a gruesome smile played upon Professor Selwyn's face and he raised his wand pointing it at Lillie.

Lillie turned around and sprinted down the corridor slamming the door behind her trying to make as much noise as possible. She heard the door blast open off its hinges and crash to the floor, and just as she reached the staircase Professor Selwyn cried "Incarcerus!" Lillie felt ropes wrap themselves around her arms and legs and she fell down the stairs. It wasn't long before Lillie lost consciousness.

Gill's Point of View:

There was a slam from upstairs and Gill jumped, they all looked up at the ceiling and a second later they heard a thunderous crash; Gill and the others all moved into the hall. There was a shout that sounded like a spell and a split-second later the shape of Lillie came into view bouncing down the stairs, she was wrapped in ropes and she was clearly unconscious.

There was a scream from beside her but Gill didn't know or care who it was for at that moment the thin form of Professor Selwyn came marching down the stairs. He crouched beside the small still body on the ground and grabbed it, he looked at the group gathered at the bottom of the stairs for a moment and then, with a loud crack, he was gone.

Author's note:

Thanks go out to all the usual as well as the people who have added me to their favourites.

Sorry I took such a long time, but I had serious writer's block and it is the longest chapter that I have written so far.

Please forgive any typos and other such things.

AND PLEASE REVIEW! Good, bad, long short, they are all welcome.