Disclaimer: J.K. Rowling is amazing, and i am not.
We woke up early, taking turns in the shower quickly before drying off and dressing appropriately, tight black pants with running shoes, black shirt that was tight-fitting but not to conspicuous. I tucked my wand in my back pocket, absent-mindedly running my hands through my hair, waiting for James. He came down a moment later, brushing down his hair that had already sprung up around his head. As he walked down to me I waited until he was standing directly in front of me, before pushing my own hands in his hair, messing it up. I leaned up to him.
"I like it better messier." I whispered into his hair and he shivered. He leaned down and kissed my neck, making me shiver in response.
"If anything happens.." he started but I cut him off.
"Don't say that. Nothing's going to happen. We're making it out of here, together, and alive." I said, needing the reassurance more than him.
"You're right, I'm sorry." he said back to me. I nodded into his chest. We stayed like that for a while before knowing we needed to leave. We separated but kept our hands together, turning on the spot, facing the suffocation, and then reappearing back in Sirius' living room. Sirius was there, obviously, along with Amelia, Caradoc, and Dumbledore.
"Ah, now that we are all here, I would like to get started. I know that the death Eaters have taken Remus, Edgar, and Benjy captive in a remote location just outside of Britain. I will apparate you all there, and trust you will find your way back here by nightfall. I have an enormous amount of trust in you all. I hope everything goes well." and with that, he waved his wand and I was in the huge suction tube again, suffocating when I could finally breath again.
I was standing outside of a huge building that had a condemned sign on the cover. I looked around and saw that all four of my companions had come with me. The building we were standing next to looked horrible, filled with broken windows and the ground was littered with rusty bottles. It didn't make matters much better than that a huge thunder storm was raging around us.
"Ok, we'll have to split up of course, to start off with, until we find a way inside. When you find a way in, shoot a lightning bolt in the air, and it will remain a tad bit longer than the rest, and a tad bit bluer to assure you we have found an entrance. Amelia, Lily, and James go together. I will go with Sirius." Caradoc said, looking at all of us intently. "Good luck." and without a backwards glance, he walked purposely forward, Sirius at his side until they disappeared into the fog.
"Let's go." Amelia said, and strode the opposite way. This part was slightly uneventful. We searched the piles of debris, occasionally looking up believing that the lightning strikes were getting longer, but realizing that they weren't. But then one strike stood out from the rest, it hovered just to the left of the building, parallel to where we were, and it stood still for about five seconds, a deep blue, and then flashed once, then disappeared.
"That's it." Amelia said, and we followed her until we could see two figures in the distance. When we got close enough to make out the outlines of the figures, we realized that it was not Sirius and Caradoc, it was two death eaters, and I recognized them. We skidded to a stop and I looked at the two men up ahead. After searching for about three seconds, I realized that the huge lumps at their feet were Sirius and Caradoc, bound and tied up. I tried to stop a scream in my throat, and choked back a sob. The men I recognized were Travers and Rookwood, two people that had graduated a few years back. They were talking in quick, quiet voices.
"We'll have to get them inside and put them with the others. He won't be happy that they found our lair so quickly, you know how he hates relocating." said Travers, looking down at Sirius and Caradoc.
"How did they even find the entrance? It's so well hidden even I have trouble finding it most days." Rookwood said, his reedy voice traveling making it easier to hear.
"I'm not sure. It's identical to the wall, so one of them must be very talented at Charms to see through that." Travers responded.
"Well, it does no good dawdling out here. He'll find out eventually. Let's go." Rookwood said, he hoisted up Sirius, who had a large cut over his left eye, and Travers grabbed Caradoc who seemed to have a bruise covering most of his face. They dragged the bodies backward into the wall, where they disappeared.
"Of course, it's just the wall itself." Amelia said. She seemed calm, and seeing the look on my face sighed. "Lily, we wanted them to get caught, or we would have never found the entrance. They did it on purpose. Caradoc's too skilled of a wizard to actually get caught on accident. It was just to find the entrance."
"Don't you think you should have told me that? Before I start freaking out!" I said, my voice squeaking slightly on the last word.
"Love, we had to. Now come on, we have to keep going." James said, squeezing my hand slightly before letting go. I nodded and we followed Amelia to the outer rim of the wall before bracing ourselves, and we walked straight through. It was a very odd sensation, and I'm sure it looked comical. I put my hand in first and watched it disappear through and then I walked the rest of the way and felt a sort of odd bubbling sensation in my stomach before reaching the other side. We were in a dimly lit hallway that seemed to go on for miles in a steady decline. The lanterns hanging from the wall were casting shadows that seemed to encircle us as we continued down the path. We kept walking, Amelia seemed to be following an unseen trail, so I kept to myself, slowly going over tactics in my head, repeating spells, and thinking of how we were to get out of this alive.
We passed many doorways, some open and some closed. Most of them were eerily silent, but we passed a couple where I could hear mutterings coming from the closed doors, and once we even heard screaming but Amelia just ushered us forward without a backward glance. I didn't know what she was following, but it must have been very distinctive to her, because I couldn't see anything except the small beams of light the lanterns caused. After about ten minutes of walking, we came to a stop in front of a simple wooden door.
"Stop." she whispered. "Here is where things get tricky. We have no plans past this. I followed Caradoc's trail, but that does not mean Remus, Benjy and Edgar are here. Your main goal is to get the three men out. Mine is to recover Sirius and Caradoc. Meet at the door. You have exactly one hour, if you are not there, we will leave and re-meet at Sirius', with or without you. You are expected to do the same. Understood?"
When we both nodded, she gave us a curt nod and opened the door walking inside. We followed her in and I looked around us. We were in a huge chamber that appeared to be empty except for a huge cage. On closer look there were human figures in the cage. Following James lead, I rushed over to the cage and Amelia disappeared through another door at the edge of the hall.
"James?" a voice asked and we both turned to see Remus, just wearing a pair of pants, covered in dirt, chained to the ground by his ankles, and chained to his hands were thick cords leading to two other people. I could just make out outlines and could tell that the first was Edgar Bones, and the other was a young girl, probably around fifteen.
"Where's Benjy?" I whispered, leaning in towards Remus. He sighed and motioned to the girl who I could tell was silently crying. She lifted up her right hand to show a limp chain, and connected to that chain was a hand, a human hand and that was it. The growing horror swept over me and I looked to the wall behind them, where a huge splotch of red swathed the wall and floor. There were literal chunks seemingly everywhere and I wanted to vomit, but knew I could not. "W-what happened?"
"He tried to get the little girl out and fought them, he was blasted instantly by Bellatrix." Remus said. "But there's no time for that no. You have to listen to me, these chains are enchanted. They will burn us if you try to blast them or anything. Morgan's hand almost burned off when the blasted Benjy. You have to be careful on what you are going to do. Be careful, Edgar is still passed out."
"Ok, I have a plan. Did you see Sirius anywhere?" James asked Remus who shook his head dejectedly.
"No, it's only us. They, they blasted Morgan's family before we got here. She's just a muggle, doesn't understand a word of what we're saying about magic and is scared. I don't know what to do. I'm so glad you came." Remus replied. James nodded and then turned to me.
"Ok, so if the chains burn whenever they're touched, what if one of us heating the metal, making it expand, at the same time one of us is freezing the persons skin? It will be painful, but it should prevent them from burning." James said to me.
"No, that should work. We just need to make sure we don't freeze the metal, because that will make it contract." I said. I turned toward Remus.
"Remus, you first. You heard James' plan. This will hurt, you will feel your hand literally freeze, but that's the least of your problems. You need to make sure the moment the chain is big enough to slip it off. Here's my scarf. Use it to bite down on." I passed him my scarf through the cage, which was luckily large enough to fit my hand into. Remus nodded and shoved the scarf into his mouth. He nodded to us that he was ready. I raised my wand.
"Anapeo!" I whispered at Remus' hand and at once it started turning blue, Remus bit down on the towel hard, trying to muffle his shouting.
"Incendio!" James' whispered and the metal cuff around Remus' wrist glowed bright red. We stayed like this for around three minutes while Remus shouted in pain as he tried to slide the cuff off. After about one more minute, he managed to slip the cuff past his wrist and it slid to the ground with a clang. I stopped my spell at once and so did James. Remus slumped to the ground clutching his hand. I immediately conjured small flames and floated them over to Remus who weakly clutched them up in his hand, warming it up again.
"I'm so sorry." I whispered and reached for him. He grabbed my hand weakly in his and held on. It was as cold as ice.
"Let's do Edgar now. He has two chains so it will be worse." James said. "Stupefy!" he whispered at Edgar, who slumped into even more unconsciousness.
"What was that for!" I whispered at him.
"So he won't scream." James said. I nodded and we started the spell on his right hand first. After a few moments Remus managed to slip it off, his hand covered by my scarf. It clanged to the ground also. We repeated the procedure with the next one and James pointed at Edgar, taking off the spell. He awoke with a shout, quickly muffled by Remus pinning him to the ground, bring Morgan down on top of them. She was still crying. She seemed to understand not to make noise, but I could tell she didn't want to be next, even if she didn't know what it was we were doing.
"Morgan right?" I whispered to her and she nodded. "My names Lily. We're going to get you out of here safe alright?" she nodded again. "But you have to do something for me. When you feel this chain getting big enough to fall, drop it as fast as you can. This will hurt, but you can't scream okay? You cant." She nodded again and I could see the fear flood her eyes. "Let's go James." I whispered and slowly raised my wand. I pointed it at the girl and recited the spell, her hand immediately turning blue and she bit down on my scarf hard, tears pouring down her face, head back toward the ceiling. Her scream was muffled but filled with pain. James quickly did his spell and the band started expanding. Thankfully, she had very skinny wrists and we got both off quite quickly. She sat down afterwards, sobbing into my scarf.
"Now how do we get them out of the cage?" I asked James, almost forgetting to whisper.
"Well isn't that a lovely question." replied a chilling voice. I turned around to see, right in front of me in a black robe, eyes slightly tilted like a snake with a hint of scarlet, a man, a man who I had only met once before. "Please, continue. It's very interesting to watch you try to escape my traps. Most people have not lasted this far. Of course, most don't get the courtesy I'm giving you, but the pair of you, I have to admit, intrigue me."
"Let them go." I said fiercely, mustering all the courage I had into my voice.
"Certainly." he said in a chillingly cool voice. With a snap of his fingers the cage disappeared.
"Thank you?" I said questionably.
"Oh Ms. Evans, don't you understand? I only needed them here so I could reach you, not that I'm not interested in Mr. Lupin over there, but we do not except half-breeds into our 'business'. But anyway, I am interested in the pair of you. Engaged I see, how lovely, just lovely. But you see, I do not believe in love, Dumbledore's greatest weapon. Alas, you do. But you see, I am very interested in the pair of you, so I'm asking, yet again, for you to join me."
"And once again, I'll join you when hell freezes over." James said.
Voldemort smiled. "You will regret that." He pointed his wand at Morgan.
"Crucio." She started to scream, falling to the floor, grabbing at the ground, screaming and screaming and screaming.
"Stop!" I shouted at him and he looked to me with a smile and Morgan fell limp. "She's just a child." I said to him.
"Ah miss Evans, don't you understand? She is a Muggle, and Muggles do not deserve to live. They are nothing."
I fought back the urge to immaturely shoot back "your face is nothing". And that was when I thought of it. I tapped the back of James hand twice and knew that he would figure it out as I went along.
"So what if I joined you? What then? Why do you want us so bad?" I could see James slowly backing up and getting Morgan off her feet. He roused the others together.
"Oh now Miss Evans, don't be selfish, I can obviously continue my plans without you, it's just you two, Dumbledore's golden ones, that would certainly complete my plans." he said and seemingly enjoying the moment, leaned back and closed his eyes, sighing in content. I motioned with my hands for Morgan and the rest to go, and they slowly backed away, towards the door that we had walked into.
"But what is this brilliant plan of yours? What is it you want to accomplish?" I said, trying to give them enough time.
"Don't you see Miss Evans? My goal is not so different from Dumbledore's. I want to unite the Magical Community as one, to make us rise over the rest and embrace our real power. It does not necessarily mean killing innocent people, but people that oppose me have to die."
"So you want us to unite over the Muggles. Why is that so?"
"Oh you must see this. Imagine a world where wizards are on top. Where we no longer have to hide. Where we will be the leaders, the famous, the successful."
"So basically, there's just a little kid inside of you just dying to be an actor huh? Because what you don't get is that "uniting" over the Muggles isn't going to do any good. Killing innocent people isn't going to do any good. Because there will always be someone to fight, always someone who opposes you, always someone to die. So you need to calm down with your takeover plans, because eventually someone will get the chance to strike you, and you'll be the dead one."
"Oh Miss Evans, I plan on living for quite a long time." I noticed as he said this that he absentmindedly traced a circle on his hand, like a ring had once been in its place.
"No one can live forever."
"That is where you are wrong. I have every plan of living forever." I didn't have any plausible thing to say after this statement, it was so confusing. "Now, I think it is time to stop this meager escape route you have planned. Bella." I raised my eyebrows confused.
"Whose Bella?" I asked.
"That would be me." a voice snarled behind me and I turned in time to see a witch raise her wand. "Sna-" but her spell was cut off by another voice coming from a doorway.
"Levicorpus!" She was swung up into the air by her ankles, before being dropped back down on her head, which slammed into the concrete, then back up again, three times, before dropping back down. "Hello cousin, how have you been?"
"Sirius!" James shouted from the other doorway before that too was blasted off by it's hinges, members of Voldemort's party running in, brandishing their wands.
"RUN!" I looked towards the voice and it was Amelia, racing through the door with Sirius and Caradoc at her side. I backed away, looked at Voldemort once more, and ran like hell, straight for James. I dodged battling lights. Amelia, dueling three wizards, Caradoc two, Sirius and Bellatrix locked into a frenzied duel, before running into some trouble myself. Travers and Rudolph blocked my path.
"Where do you think you're going missy?" Travers said, and lunged for me, but I sprung out my wand and shot a curse at him, which he narrowly missed. I prepared myself for a duel with the two. They fired curses at me every second and I barely had time to think let alone fight back. I could only imagine how Amelia was dueling three. I shot curses at them and deflected the ones they threw at me. I could feel many hit me though, cutting me above my left eye, which slowly drifted into my eye, blocking my vision. I had a bad cut on my left side, and an even worse one right underneath my chest. I felt like bruises were covering my whole body, but I finally managed to stun Travers and just fight Rudolph, who went down quickly when a stunning spell fired from a passerby hit him. I only had time to think of my friends before grabbing both of their wands and race back toward the door, towards James.
He was fighting only one wizard, but I could tell he was very powerful, not removing the mask. I could see black hair sticking out from underneath though and pale skin underneath that. "Stupefy!" I yelled. And he fell to the ground. James looked up to see who had helped him and smiled when he saw it was me. But the smile did not last long. He looked down and I saw a blood stain slowly spread at the top of his left thigh. He looked back up at me before grimacing in pain. I sprinted towards him as fast as I could and finally reached him. We raced out the door together, where Remus, Edgar, and Morgan were pacing back and forth, staring at the door as if expecting us.
"We don't have wands, or we'd have dissaparated." I tossed him one of the wands I had collected and Edgar the other. They nodded in thanks.
"Can we dissaparate with a Muggle?" I asked, looking at Morgan.
"Let's hope so." James said. We all grabbed hands, Morgan clutching mine tightly and spun on the spot. I spun easily, but it took a second for Morgan to get off the ground and when she did, she seemed unable to stop spinning, making it almost impossible to picture my destination. Once we did however, I stumbled to the ground, laying on Sirius' floor. I started coughing and was horrified to see blood appear on the floor. We all laid there for a few minutes, collected ourselves together when Morgan started screaming. We looked to where she was looking at and saw two figures. Sirius stood, brushing off a stunned death eater at his feet. With a dog like grin he said, "Miss me?"
A/N: i'm sorry it took longer than i promised, but i made it extra long for you guys! PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE REVIEW. it's what keeps me going. you guys are the best. i'll give you a shoutout if you you who that one death eater fighting James was. please review!
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