Most of the Ministry stayed outside in the snow to preserve the dragon (and wyvern) bodies and transport them elsewhere. One of them, a young, slightly grizzled looking man, joined us in Dumbledore's office when the professors finally returned.

"Report," he snapped at us.

"And you are?" Sirius asked, his back stiffening.

"Moody. Alastor Moody. I'm in charge of security here," the wizard narrowed his eyes at Sirius. "A Black, are ye?"

"I hardly see what that has to do with anything." The boys suddenly seemed larger than usual. Their shoulders took up more space and an intense energy filled the air around us.

"Get yer hackles down, boys. I don't give a rat's ass about your family 'less ye got summit to do with them. Now," the big man settled back into a cushy chair by Dumbledore's desk, "report."

"I, too, would like to hear the report." Despite the serious nature of the situation, there was a slight twinkle in Dumbledore's eyes. Either Moody or the boys amused him.

"There's not much to report, Professor," Lily said earnestly. "We were out in the snow, staying in sight of the watch witch, when flames engulfed her out of nowhere. I think Genre sensed it coming first, because she was on her feet with her wand in her hand before the rest of us knew what happened. We thought there was just one dragon at first, so we sent Mary to fetch you, but then there was another, and another…We just kept casting spells. We alternated between shields, stupefy and aguamente."

"Smart," Moody muttered to himself. "Mostly defensive, though."

"You didn't see anyone before the attack?" Dumbledore asked. I swallowed hard.

"No one, sir," I answered truthfully.

"Alright. Dismissed. You might want to stop by the Hospital Wing for the shock, some chocolate maybe." Dumbledore smiled gently at us. "Alastor and I have some business to discuss."

We left, but we didn't go to the Hospital Wing. The boys seemed to want to keep us all together, but Lily and Mary led me up to our dorm where I cried myself to sleep and dreamed of dragons and poison.

My scarred ankle was throbbing in the morning and the scar itself looked a little puffier than usual. I tugged my sock firmly over it. It would have been lovely to stay in bed for the day, except my brain was already going faster than a Nimbus 1000 and I couldn't abide that. So we went to class - all of us - and pretended life was normal.

Seven by two. The two haunted me. Two what?

The perfect distraction to my inner turmoil was presented as we ate. At dinner that night, some of the sixth years seated near us started complaining about a pair of knickers stuck to one of their bedposts. Mary nudged me in the ribs.

"Oof," I huffed. "What, Mary?"

"Listen!" she said a little gleefully, tugging on a lock of Lily's hair to get her attention also.

"I can't believe the summoning spell didn't even work!" One of them complained.

"I know!" the other girl said. "It's gross, some other girl's used knickers being stuck there-"

I burst into startled laughter. Mary fell against me nearly in tears. When she looked up and saw James's interested face, she started laughing even harder until I was afraid she might wet herself. Lily, meanwhile, had turned redder than her Gryffindor scarf.

"You were the last ones in that dorm," Peter said slowly. "So…"

"Whose knickers are they?" Sirius laughed.

"Lily's! Definitely Lily's!" I gasped through more chuckles.

"Methinks milady doth protest too much," Remus said, a gleam in his eyes. I caught his gaze and grinned wickedly. (Apparently today was one of the good days, since he wasn't busy shunning me.)

"They weren't dirty!" Lily said. She looked like she couldn't decide between mortification or amusement, but in the end amusement won out.

"I blame whoever spiked Sluggy's punch at that last party," Mary grinned.

It was nice, being able to laugh and forget about the world and war waging around us for at least that long. And for days, Mary and I took to hiding Lily's knickers about the dorm (and common room, though she hadn't found that pair yet), much to her frustration. The boys offered to help us out, but we weren't that cruel.

If the Ministry presence had seemed stifling before, they took it to a whole new level now. Students weren't allowed out on the grounds at all except for classwork. Much to James's frustration, even Quidditch practices were no longer allowed.

Despite that, the professors did their best to ease the stress—even Wyandotte, to her credit. They organized a ball for all students to attend in lieu of a Hogsmeade trip near the end of the term (and luckily Slughorn seemed content with the ball so we had no party to attend instead), and every week or so the adults tried to put on some show or another. Sprout, in deference to her predecessor, quoted an entire monologue dramatically at dinner one night. That one was my favorite. The boys preferred the play-duel put on by Flitwick and Talbot. Mary pretended to hate all of them, but we would all grasp at anything to break up the monotony these days.

"What should we wear to the ball?" Mary asked one night.

"Really?" Sirius drawled from where he was slumped on the nearest armchair. "That's what you're worried about?"

"The ball is next week," Mary pointed out. "Either I look forward to that or I look forward to the day we graduate and no longer have the protection of this school. Should I brood like you instead?"

Sirius glared nastily at Mary, but she turned away from him to face Lily and me again. I smiled at her. Sometimes she seemed so flighty, but she was wise and kind and it was easy to forget. The professors organized a ball to keep us sane. We would be fools to look that particular gift-hippogriff in the beak.

"We can't exactly run by Hogsmeade to pick up new robes," Lily said thoughtfully. "We'll have to make do with what we have."

"I can lend you some sweaters, if you'd like," I joked. Sirius snorted from the chair, but Mary's remark had apparently mollified him.

Mary quirked an eyebrow at me. "Genre," she said, "I hate to break it to you, but under no circumstances will you be allowed to wear a sweater to this event."

"Do you think you'll invite Finn?" Lily asked. "He's been a guest at the school before."

I cleared my throat awkwardly. "Er…no," I said lamely. "I, um…"

Sirius perked up from his seat, his gray eyes lighting up in interest.

"You what?" Lily's eyes narrowed on my face.

"I, uh, may have told him that I liked being friends." The sleeves of my sweater covered my face nicely so I didn't have to see the looks on my friends' faces.

"You broke up with him?" Mary sounded excited.

"We weren't in a relationship or anything!" I protested. "It's not really 'breaking up.'"

"What is it, then?" Lily asked drily.

"Merlin, do we have to talk about this now?" I snapped.

"Yer," Sirius answered me. "I'm quite interested. Please, continue."

"Why would you be interested?" Mary sounded a bit offended. "Care to give Genre a spin around the dance floor, do you?"

"Against the code," Sirius said, equally offended.

"What code?" I asked. "You never did explain."

Sirius was saved from the three of us girls ganging up on him by the arrival of his friends. Remus paused, saw the only open seat was on the couch by me, and settled onto the rug instead. I tried to ignore that little twinge in my chest.

In the end, because the boys refused to discuss the code and also refused to discuss clothing (or even attendance) of the upcoming ball, Lily, Mary and I escaped up to our dorm.

"They're in a nasty mood, the lot of them," Mary said with a fake shudder.

We dug out our wardrobes, draping every clothing item except our most private on every surface available to us. Three beds, plus the tops of the wardrobes themselves and every door knob we could find housed a variety of clothes. Lily doubtfully scanning the room with a look of dismay.

"Do we have to dress up?" I asked.

That startled a look out of both of them. If the pillows hadn't been buried under sweaters and trousers, I probably would've been bludgeoned. Mary took charge, sequestering items indiscriminately from each of us and setting Lily and I to transfiguring and altering bits and pieces. Despite our asking, she refused to tell us exactly what she had in mind.

The further along we got in the project, the more obvious it became. The outfit we were sizing to Lily was airy and loose, with wave and wave of translucent greens on the skirt. Mary even instructed me to pull the beads off one of her blouses and we watched her painstakingly sew them in a simple design along the collar of the shirt. That done, she pinned the skirt and shirt together and made a few snips before sewing the new seam. The end result was charming and could have been one of Malkin's robes with no one knowing the difference. With short sleeves, it was more of a summer dress, but I charmed one of Lily's shawls to the proper shade of green in case she got cold.

More daring than either of us, Mary's homemade dress plunged in the back and clung to her ribs and side before billowing out a bit more loosely in the front. It was a clever use of one of my many sweaters (or Stan's sweaters, really). With the fabric she cut from the back, she added length to the bottom of the sweater and paired it with tights she never wore.

"But what color?" Lily asked. "Surely not blue—that's too obvious a choice."

"Why change the color?" I asked. "It's a pretty shade of gray, like mourning doves."

That earned me a duet of rolled eyes and a silencing charm. In the end, after much debating, Lily wore Mary down and they compromised with a deep plum color.

I was almost nervous to see what Mary would come up with for me; I was neither ethereal like Lily, nor bold like Mary. The styles that worked so well for them would feel unnatural on me. Mary seemed to agree, pursing her lips and humming incessantly under her breath while she sifted through the sloppy piles of clothing. Finally, she held up a tank top that laced right up the back. She held it in front of me. I crossed my arms.

"Lily," Mary said, ignoring my silent warning, "dig me up that A-line skirt, will you? The one that flares past the hips?"

Lily did as requested, though it took two tries to get the right skirt. The skirt would fall to just above my knees—the same length as our school skirts I reminded myself. Not all that short. I watched Mary twitch the fabric this way and that until she finally took the scissors that were floating around and made the alterations herself.

The dress Mary made was very pretty and simple, with the only real adornment being the lace up the back of the bodice. I tried it on at their request, trying to ignore how naked my arms and legs felt. This wasn't the kind of outfit I could wear socks or trainers with. My ankle would be bared to the world.

"What about the color?" I asked meekly. The dress was beautiful, I would find the bravery to wear it somehow.

"I don't know," Mary said with a frown.

"I like the white," Lily suggested. "Maybe if we just tinge it with another color it won't make her look so pale."

"Wonderful, Lils," I muttered, "that makes me feel good." She looked unashamed and began holding up various colors against my skin.

"I think you're right," Mary admitted. "I like the white. We can add just a touch of color; pink, I think. Or peach?"

"Not peach!" I hurriedly interrupted. I didn't want to look like I was nude in front of everyone.

"Pink, then," Lily said. And it was decided. The touch of pink was so subtle I could barely even see it myself, but they assured me it added some color to my skin.

Too lazy to clean up, we nested in piles of clothes that night. In the morning, Lily insisted we get our act together so we begrudgingly shoved our clothes back under the beds and into drawers, though we took care to hang our new dresses up.

"You should be a designer," I yawned at Mary at the breakfast table. "You've got an eye for it."

Mary smiled gratefully at me but continued to drink her tea and eat her toast.

When the boys joined us, they seemed contrite after their behavior the night before.

"We weren't trying to make fun of you," James explained, "it's just…clothes."

"We understand perfectly," Lily said drily. "It was worth the effort, though." She pecked him sweetly on the cheek. I play gagged at Mary who mimed gouging her eyes out.

"Mature," Sirius grumbled.

I turned in surprise at the warm presence suddenly at my back. Remus grinned weakly at me, reaching for the porridge and sugar. This was the first time he'd sat near me since the last full moon. Across the table, Sirius dropped one eyelid in a lazy wink at me.

Some of the other professors seemed to be running interference that week, stopping Wyandotte from giving out so many detentions and easing up on our homework load for what felt like the first time in years. Or maybe it was just that without studying silent magic, wand-making, auras or human transfigurations, this was the first chance I really had to enjoy the respite.

We spent the majority of our free time in front of the fireplace, lounging and breathing and definitely not worrying (or at least not talking about it). Thursday night, after History of Magic and dinner, I stretched out on the rug with a quill and scraps of parchment. Octavius's beautiful wand design, the one with moonstone, was etched in my brain. I sketched out some preliminary designs for wands I could maybe make someday in the future. I couldn't imagine them being as beautiful as his, but I was surely going to try. The sound of soft chatter and relaxed voices washed over me.

"How did Finn take it?" James's voice broke through my concentration – or rather the subject of his question did.

"She hasn't said one way or the other to us," Mary answered. "Keeps changing the topic each time we bring it up."

I kept sketching and hoped my hair covered the tips of my burning ears.

"He wasn't right for her anyway," Sirius declared, "too boring and old."

"She liked him, though," Remus said.

"I don't know," Lily said thoughtfully. "It was more the other way around, I think."

"Are you quite finished?" I asked, feeling like I would die of embarrassment right then and there.

"So, is it really over between you two?" Sirius asked with no regard to my feelings.

"Stuff a sodden sock in your mouth," I told him. Lily's eyes glimmered in amusement. "And Lily—I'm taking one from your book. You smarmy toe-rag."

They all burst out laughing, except Peter who had just ditched us for the restroom.

"We want details, Genre!" Sirius continued over the laughter. "Amuse us!"

I let my eyelids flutter down a little, the way I saw Mary do when she wanted a man's attention. Nibbling on my lower lip, like I was being shy, I gazed up at the rest of them. Mary narrowed her eyes suspiciously at me.

"Well…" I dropped my voice, glancing around as if to make sure no one else was nearby. The others leaned forward, clearly thinking I had something to say. "I mean…I guess I could say, he didn't say not to…but…" I glanced around furtively. Remus also looked suspicious now.

"What?" James demanded. "Tell us!"

"Will you tell me something first?" I asked silkily.

Lily glanced back and forth between me and Mary.

"Is this a trade?" James demanded.

"Mmhm," I said, twisting a bit of hair around my fingers.

"Fine," Sirius snapped impatiently, "what?"

"Tell us the Code," I promptly demanded, dropping the flirty-girl act.

Mary choked up in laughter, reeling back in her seat. I grinned a bit smugly at the boys, who were now all leaning back with similar expressions of disapproval.

"No," James said flatly.

"Then, no," I said back sweetly.

"Tease," Remus grumbled under his breath. I winked at him.

Once again, we learned nothing of the code. In all fairness, they learned nothing of my very boring break-up, either.