"But where would he have gone?" whispered Alodie for something like the twentieth time in the past half-hour. She was seated in the row ahead of Lily in their History of Magic lecture, leaning fretfully over Wenyi's desk, the two girls' heads bowed together as they discussed, endlessly, James Potter's absence.

Their ghostly teacher Professor Binns had presumably been deaf when he'd died — or perhaps he simply couldn't be bothered to tell them off — for he ignored the chatting girls completely as he droned on about the International Warlock Convention of 1289.

"I mean, it was almost curfew, and he just up and leaves? And now he's missed breakfast and class!"

It was true: James Potter had not shown up to their History of Magic lecture, although neither had Black, Pettigrew, or Lupin, for that matter. Lucky for them, Professor Binns had failed to notice this as well.

"I'm just saying, it doesn't make any sense."

Lily, twirling her quill in boredom, was tempted to interject that if Alodie wanted things to make sense she probably shouldn't have chosen to date James Potter — the boy was a walking bafflement — but then Lily remembered that she did not care. She'd had to remind herself of this fact a few times throughout the past several weeks. Alodie and James had started dating shortly after the Christmas holiday, and Lily found the entire affair to be extremely annoying. It didn't help matters that it was all Alodie talked about in the dormitory — and now in class.

"What if he got hurt? What if he's in the hospital wing?" whimpered Alodie. "Or — or what if he got expelled and they already sent him away and I never see him again?"

"Oh for the love of god," muttered Lily, unable to help herself. "Have you noticed that all the other boys are missing too? They probably just snuck out to do something stupid, stayed out late, and slept through class. Not a big mystery."

Alodie jerked around to glare at Lily, her blonde hair bobbing at her shoulders in agitation. "Was I talking to you?"

Lily rolled her eyes and returned unenthusiastically to her notes.

When at last the bell rang for lunch, Lily walked out of the classroom alongside Mary, her understanding of the International Warlock Convention of 1289 roughly the same as when she'd walked in.

"Well, that was predictably mind-numbing," said Mary as they joined the crush of students headed towards the Great Hall.

"No…speak. Brain…melted," moaned Lily.

Mary snorted. "Honestly, is it too much ask that our professors be, you know, alive? That seems like a pretty low bar for academic excellence."

"6 feet too low," agreed Lily. "But never mind! Now we get to engage in my favorite of all subjects: lunch. Where we shall study the great and noble history of…eating lunch."

"Oh, is that what you're studying?"

Lily cast a sideways glance at her friend. "Your tone. It suggests insinuation. Care to elaborate?"

"I'm not insinuating anything. Only that you seem to spend most of your meals studying…your boyfriend." Her tone was light, but Lily knew this was a touchy subject. It was true that Lily spent nearly every meal at the Ravenclaw table these days. It was when she and Anson got to see each other, after all, being in different houses. She suspected Mary was a little jealous…but Lily had invited her to join them multiple times, always to be turned down.

As they reached the Great Hall, however, Lily decided to try again. "I wish you'd come sit with us. I don't see why you won't."

"What, and miss the next exciting installment of 'Where in the World is James Potter?'"

"They're nice people, the Ravenclaws. I don't see what you have against them."

"I don't have anything against them," said Mary stubbornly. "I just have nothing in common with them and I don't feel like being a third wheel."

"You're not!"

"It's fine, Lily. I'm a big girl. My feelings aren't hurt."

When Lily arrived at the Ravenclaw table, Anson was already there, chatting amiably with Florence and Phineas. They had saved her a seat. It was a small thing, perhaps, but for someone who had spent years feeling like the odd one out — searching along the Gryffindor table for an open spot or, when things got bad, taking her lunch and eating it in an empty classroom — this small gesture meant everything.

She slipped into the seat beside Anson and right into their conversation. Phineas was complaining about something Professor Flitwick had said, Florence was telling him off for being beastly, and Anson was laughing.

Bright shafts of winter sunlight danced through the Great Hall, shimmering across the tables and glittering off cutlery. As Lily reached for a jacket potato, she couldn't help but smile slightly at the glint of silver on her wrist.

Christmas in Cokeworth had been quiet and small and hollow, like all holidays had been since her mother's death. Petunia had been slightly more sullen than usual and matters were only made worse when a large barn owl had arrived on Christmas morning, tapping its beak at the frost-laced windows. Petunia had barricaded herself in the cupboard and refused to come out until Lily had claimed a small parcel from the (perfectly calm) bird and sent it on its way.

The parcel had turned out to be a gift from Anson: a thin, silver bracelet with a delicate little charm in the shape of a Snitch. Lily wore it all the time, enjoying the small thrill she felt whenever she caught a glimpse of it dangling on her wrist.

The news that Lily Evans was dating Anson Nott, the Cup-winning Seeker from Ravenclaw, had been a favorite topic of gossip around the school, but for once Lily didn't much mind the attention. She'd been spending nearly all of her time these days with Anson, stealing moments between classes, 'studying' in the library, finding other certain private corners of the castle, eating her meals with the Ravenclaws or at Slug Club dinners….and with it all, a strange feeling had overcome her: She was happy.

And stranger still: She felt guilty about it.

No, not guilty. It didn't make any sense to feel guilty. But it always took a while for the gloom that clung to Cokeworth to dissipate once she returned to the castle. Holidays were hard. Her family pretended for the rest of the year like they'd all moved on, but Christmas had been her mum's favorite, and no amount of loudly-sung carols or paper garlands could cover up the fact that everything was wrong now. Broken, even. And returning from that to Hogwarts and Anson's bright smile was like stepping out from a dark cave blinking into fearsome sunlight…

"Where did you go?" said Anson softly from beside her.

"What?" Lily pulled herself back to the present to find Anson smiling down at her. "Oh, sorry. Just spacing out. What were we talking about?"

"Dearborn," said Phineas through a thick bite of beans and potato.

"What about him?"

"He actually had us read from the textbook today. Just...read. And then he sat at his desk, scowling at the newspaper. It was bizarre."

"Not quite up to his usual standard of lecturing us all on how we're going to die horrible deaths," said Anson lightly.

"I heard he got probation from the governors," said Florence. "They don't approve of his teaching methods."

This was news to Lily. She had noticed that Professor Dearborn seemed slightly less engaged than usual following the holiday, but she hadn't thought too much about it, still crawling out of her own slump of holiday gloom as she was.

"Apparently he made some Hufflepuff cry by talking about that attack in Leeds."

"What," interjected Lily, "he can't talk about current events because someone might get upset? They're going to read about it in the newspaper anyway."

"Don't be ridiculous," said Phineas giving his fork a facetious little wave. "Hufflepuffs don't read."

Anson laughed, but Lily did not. "I like Professor Dearborn," she said flatly. "He's the only one around here who tells the truth about anything."

"Still," said Anson with a good-natured shrug, "if it means he'll finally teach the N.E.W.T. exam material, I won't complain too much."

"Who cares about exams if you're dead?" said Lily heatedly, and Anson frowned at her, looking politely baffled by this outburst.

There was an awkward pause, then Florence said, "Well, personally, I think I might die from .T.s. I thought it'd get easier after O.W.L.s, but I'm very sorry Lily, you have nothing to look forward to."

And the conversation moved on from there, Lily uneasily following along behind it.

She couldn't help but replay this moment obsessively in her head during her Ancient Runes lecture following lunch. They were working on their translations today and the scroll of runic nonsense on her desk meant absolutely nothing to her, which made it all too easy to lose herself in ruminations. As a matter of fact, she had quite a few things on her mind.

It troubled her, Anson's cavalier response to Professor Dearborn being reprimanded for his political leanings. She had always assumed they'd agreed on politics — his mother was Muggle-born, after all — but as she reflected on it, she realized they'd never actually talked about politics. They'd never really talked about much of anything serious, to be honest. When they were alone, they had better things to do than talk, and when they weren't, Phineas or Florence usually dominated the conversation.

She twirled her quill, watching the glimmer of the little Snitch on her bracelet as she did so, and suddenly, the lovely bracelet felt as wrong as the baubles on the Christmas tree in her empty, hollow house. A distraction.

But a distraction from what? From her addiction to misery? She'd told herself she wanted this year to be different, to be better, and now it was. Why was she so determined to be unhappy? Why shouldn't she just have fun with a beautiful boy who liked kissing her? What did it matter if they didn't completely agree on everything? Things with Anson had been lovely and light and fun. Why did she feel the need to go and make it complicated?

It's just because you've gone home, she chided herself. That was it. She'd gone home and soaked up all the sorrow, and now the enjoyment of anything felt like…like a betrayal to the memory of her mum. As though by being carelessly happy, she was somehow forgetting her, cheapening her loss.

But she wouldn't want you to be sad.

That's what her dad told her after the funeral, so Lily did her best to hide it. She did her best to act like everything was fine. After all, it had been over a year since her mother had succumbed to illness, and everyone else seemed to think Lily should be over it, so why wasn't she? Why did memories still well up at the worst possible times and places where they had no business? Why could she still close her eyes and see herself curled on her mother's bed, while doctors fretted on the other side of the door? Why could she still hear the silly, frivolous stories of magic she'd whispered in her mum's ear, useless to do anything real in the face of a ruinous disease…?

Which brought her to the second thing on her mind.

As surreptitiously as she could, Lily shot a glance over her shoulder to the back of the classroom. Remus Lupin sat there alone, his arms folded on the desk, his face pressed into the crook of an elbow. She watched him for a moment, concerned. He was hardly the only one taking a nap — they were supposed to be working on their translations, but Professor Babbling didn't really care what they did so long as they did it quietly. Lily wouldn't have thought twice about Remus's current position, if it weren't for the fact that he looked so pallid and miserable. Again. She knew that look with painful familiarity. She'd seen it etched across her own mum's face for months on end. It was the look of someone worn down by incurable illness.

Next to her, Severus followed her gaze and gave her a pointed look, which Lily pointedly ignored.

"You know what yesterday was—" Severus began in a low voice.

"Yes," said Lily primly. "Tuesday."

"That's not what I meant."

"Drop it, Sev."

"But look at—"

"I said drop it. You're wrong, okay? He was with me last night for prefect duties, so there's no way."

This was a lie. Severus frowned, as though troubled by this new information, then he returned to his translation in stony silence. She wasn't sure he believed her, but she wasn't about to tell him that Remus had missed prefect duties yet again. Nor would she tell him that since their conversation before Christmas, she'd been keeping up with the lunar calendar and she was fully aware that last night was the full moon. She also wasn't going to tell him that since returning to school, she'd done a lot of reading on werewolves. A lot.

And all of it had broken her heart.

She definitely wasn't going to tell him about the passage on lycanthropy she'd read last week that perfectly described Remus's symptoms. Nor would she mention the memoir she'd checked out from the library that was written by a werewolf but published anonymously for fear of persecution. She certainly wouldn't tell him how she'd cried herself to sleep after finishing it.

She wouldn't tell Severus any of these things because he had made it very clear that he did not have Remus Lupin's best interests at heart. If it was true — if Remus Lupin was a werewolf — well, from what she'd read, Lily wouldn't wish that on her worst enemy, no matter how much she disliked him. And the thing was, she didn't dislike Remus Lupin at all. Quite the contrary. To her own surprise, she had grown to like him quite a lot.

Eventually the bell rang, and Lily watched as a group of students strode by, talking enthusiastically about their rune translation. How anyone could find these old rocks so fascinating was one mystery too many for her; she turned her attention back to Remus. He hadn't moved at all.

"I'll catch up with you later," she told Severus firmly, stuffing her books into her bag. He looked for a moment as though he wanted to argue, but then he just shrugged and slouched out of the classroom. Professor Babbling was gathering her things up at the lectern. The teacher glanced over at Remus, saw that Lily was apparently going to handle it, and left without pause.

One time during prefect rounds Remus had half-jokingly suggested that Professor Babbling didn't like him. Now Lily was wondering if it wasn't true. They'd have to know, wouldn't they? If he was a werewolf. The teachers would have to know.

"Remus?"

"M'not sleeping."

Lily smiled. "No," she agreed. "Of course not. Come on, class is over."

Remus sat up and looked blearily around the empty classroom. "What…already?"

Lily laughed and began gathering up his quill, ink-pot, and unused parchment, tucking them neatly into the worn bag hanging over the back of his chair. "Don't worry, it was very boring, and I'll make you a copy of my notes." She slung his bag over her shoulder. "Come on, let's go get some dinner."

"I can carry my—"

"Oh, shush."

She looped her arm through his and steered him out of the classroom. His hands were clammy and cold, his forehead rimmed with sweat. She made conversation the whole way through the halls, but it was mostly for appearances, mindless little things calculated specifically so Remus could nod along without much effort. He really did seem like a sneeze would knock him over.

Growing up as a Muggle-born witch, Lily had learned to believe the unbelievable, to accept things that could not possibly be true. She'd had to. But this had been used against her on several occasions. The other girls in the dormitory had thought it funny to tell her outlandish tales about the magical world that were complete and utter crock, just to see how long it took her to figure it out. Not that she thought Sev would intentionally trick her, of course, but he might be wrong about this. Remus Lupin might not be a werewolf. He might just be very, very ill.

But she didn't think so.

They reached the Great Hall and Lily directed them towards the Gryffindor table where, unfortunately, Sirius Black caught her eye. He waved her over, and reluctantly she headed towards the end of the table where Sirius, Peter, and James all sat.

The revelation that Remus Lupin might be a werewolf did not change the way she thought about him, but it complicated the way she thought about his friends. They had to know. They were always covering for him, always taking extra notes in class, always walking him back from the hospital wing…

But it didn't add up to the kind of people she understood them to be. Just the other week, Mary had pointed out a photo of Sirius Black in the society pages of the Daily Prophet. In the photo, he had stood looking haughty and superior, dressed in expensive robes and surrounded in conversation, as the photo's caption helpfully pointed out, by such notable Wizarding figures as Alphard Black and Abraxas Malfoy.

Abraxas Malfoy. He was the one writing all those awful op-eds, pushing the idea of banning Muggle-borns from Ministry positions. If that was the kind of company that Sirius Black kept, how could he possibly be friends with a werewolf?

Sirius shot her a suspicious look as they reached the table. "You're late," he said to Remus. "Did Evans kidnap you? Blink twice if she's holding you hostage for nefarious prefect purposes."

Remus yawned. "If you must know," he said, settling heavily into the seat beside Sirius, "I was fast asleep in the Ancient Runes classroom. Probably would still be there, if Lily hadn't woken me up."

Sirius raised his eyebrows at Lily, who had purposely remained standing. She shrugged. "Well, there's a time and a place for sleeping in the Ancient Runes classroom," she said reasonably, "and that time is during Ancient Runes lecture. Anything else is overachieving."

James let out a laugh at this, evidently in spite of himself. He hadn't so much as looked at her since she arrived. She didn't know why she'd noticed that. She certainly didn't care.

"Well," said Sirius with an exaggerated bow of the head, "thank you for returning him to us. We do so worry when he goes missing. We tried to make him wear a sign that read, 'If found, return to Sirius Black,' but he put up such an awful fuss."

"Oh, shut up," said Remus.

"Poor Remus," said Lily. "I don't know how you put up with—"

"There you are!"

Alodie Blunt squeezed onto the bench next to James and promptly planted a long and lingering kiss upon his lips. Lily tried not to gag too audibly. She looked politely away and found herself catching Sirius's eye. He made a grotesque face, and Lily had to swallow a surprised laugh.

She suspected she wasn't the only Gryffindor who was getting a little sick of Alodie and James's relationship. The two seemed to aspire to be as public about it as possible, snogging all over the castle in very conspicuous places. A few nights ago, Lily had found them blocking the stairs to the girls' dormitory, caught up in what seemed to be a quick good night kiss gone awry. It had taken more than a few not-so-subtle throat clearings before they got the hint and moved out of the way.

She didn't care, of course. No matter what anyone said or teased, she did not fancy him. It didn't affect her in the slightest who stuck her tongue down James Potter's throat, but regardless of who had that unhappy job, she didn't want to have to look at it all the time.

And yes, all right…maybe it was just the tiniest bit galling that it was Alodie Blunt of all people that he'd decided to snog. Alodie Blunt, the grand architect of Lily's Potter-related humiliation of third year. She could still hear the girls' taunts ringing in her ears:

"Potter and Evans sitting in a tree…"

"Oooh, if they get married do you think Snape will be the best man or the bridesmaid?"

And now, here was Alodie, sitting in his lap at meals, positively devouring his face in the common room, taking every possible opportunity to talk about what a great kisser he was in the dormitory…Lily knew it shouldn't bother her, but — no, it didn't bother her. It didn't. Because she did not want to kiss James Potter. Not now, not then, not ever.

"Well, I've got to run," announced Lily, dropping Remus's bag on the bench beside him. "Feel better, Remus."

"What's the rush, Evans?" said Sirius. "Dinner's just started. Not hungry?" There was something sly about his smile that Lily didn't like. It was almost as though he'd traveled along with her on that last train of thought.

"I'm meeting Anson to study in the library," she said primly.

"Studying, eh?" James pulled his attention away from Alodie at last. "Well, you'll certainly ace that O.W.L. on human anatomy."

Lily's eyes narrowed as he smirked up at her, but she merely held her head high and said, "At least we choose somewhere private." Then she stuffed a dinner roll in her bag and took off.

All right, so she'd lied about meeting Anson in the library, but eating dinner while watching Alodie Blunt attempt to devour James Potter's face was not a very appealing prospect, and a cursory glance to the Ravenclaw table had shown her Anson had not yet arrived to the Great Hall. As a matter of fact, she did want to go to the library, though. She hoped to check out some additional books on lycanthropy, and since she'd decided to keep this particular investigation to herself, dinner was the best time to do it. The library was always emptier during meals.

Indeed, the library was quiet as snowfall as Lily made her way through the stacks, back to a dusty corner that was growing familiar. Light peeked hopefully through the frosted panes of tall windows but failed to reach the little nook that encompassed "Dark Creatures: W - Z." She ran her finger across the leather bindings of the books, looking for something she hadn't yet read.

She wasn't sure what she hoped to find. A chapter titled "Five Foolproof Ways to Tell If Your Classmate is a Werewolf," perhaps?

She picked up a book at random, a hefty grey tome with thick, rough-edged pages. Moving closer to the light, she let the book fall open and began to read.

The werewolf is undoubtedly the most evil of all creatures and accordingly the most difficult to kill. The old myth that werewolves can be destroyed by silver is regrettably false. Indeed, there is no simple way to kill a werewolf during a transformation. The best option is to exterminate the beast while he remains in his false human form…

"Hello," said a voice from behind. Lily jumped in surprise, the book dropping from her hands with noisy thud and a slight scuffle of dust. She turned to see Anson behind her, smiling in his bemused way, Phineas at his side.

"Oh, hi," said Lily, catching her breath.

"Hi," said Anson, leaning down to kiss her. "Are you all right?"

"Yeah…you just startled me is all."

Anson peered at the books on the shelf behind her. "Reading about werewolves? No wonder you're jumpy."

"Just — keeping up with O.W.L.s…you know how it goes."

Phineas leaned down to pick up the dropped book and examined it with raised eyebrows. "Lupine Lawlessness: Why Werewolves Don't Deserve to Live, by Emerett Picardy," he read aloud. "Now there's a man after my own heart."

Lily looked at him sharply. "You can't possibly agree with him?"

He blinked back at her in surprise, then laughed. "Who in their right mind doesn't?"

"I don't! He's — he's talking about killing people because of something they can't control—"

"They're not people though, are they?" said Phineas, a surprising note of bitterness in his voice.

"That's a terrible thing to say."

"People don't turn into murderous beasts once a month, Lily."

"No," said Lily. "I suppose plenty of people are already murderous beasts all month long." She was getting upset. She could feel her temper swelling like a sailor watching the crest of a great wave about to crash, but she couldn't stop herself. She didn't think she even wanted to. "Werewolves don't ask to get bitten, you know. Are you honestly saying it'd be better if they just died?"

"Yeah," said Phineas. "I am."

Lily glared at him for a long moment. Phineas glared back. Anson stood awkwardly between them, unsure what to do. Then Lily spat, "You know, it's attitudes like yours that make people think it's okay to kill Muggles, too."

And she stormed off.

"Anson," came Phineas's drawling voice from behind, "I don't think your girlfriend likes me anymore."

Lily had made it out of the library and about half-way up the stairs before Anson caught up with her.

"Hey, hold up, will you?" he called, and she stopped, arms hugged tightly to her chest, leaning against the stairs' smooth wooden railing as he padded over, still with that bewildered look on his face. She found it significantly less charming than usual right now.

"What was that all about?" he asked.

"You're joking, right?"

"I didn't realize you were so invested in werewolf rights."

"I'm invested in everyone's rights! God, please tell me you don't agree with him?"

Anson hesitated.

"God!" cried Lily, and she turned and began to march up the stairs.

"Will you hang on a moment?" said Anson, grabbing her arm in frustration. "Give me a second to catch up. I'm not saying I agree exactly, but—"

She snatched her arm back. "But what? Either you think innocent people should be murdered because of something they can't control or you don't."

"It's not that simple, Lily."

"Yeah, it is!"

"Look, you don't understand. Phin — he's been through some rough stuff, all right? He lost his older brother to a werewolf attack. It happened when he was twelve and it was — brutal."

Lily stopped, momentarily derailed. "I didn't know that."

"Of course not. How could you?" said Anson graciously. "I'm not saying all werewolves should be murdered, but just…I don't know, maybe you could spare some of your vast wells of compassion for one of the actual victims."

Lily bit her lip. "I'm sorry about his brother."

"Yeah. He took it pretty hard, Phin."

"But I still think he's wrong."

"…Of course you do."

"I'm sorry, I just don't think people should be put to death for contracting a disease!"

"A disease," said Anson with a dismissive snort. "Listen to you. Have you ever met a werewolf, Lily?"

Lily hesitated. "I — I'm not sure."

"You're not sure?"

"Well, you see, Anson, they're regular people ninety percent of the time and most of them don't walk around wearing signs that say 'I'm a werewolf, please slaughter me.'"

"Look," said Anson, with the tone of someone who was being eminently reasonable, "I admire your commitment to human rights, but you don't know what you're talking about. If you'd met a werewolf, you'd know it. They're not like you and me. Most victims of attacks don't survive the contraction of the so-called 'disease.' The ones that do...well, let's just say they survive for a reason. They're...harder. Fiercer. They're vicious."

"That is a disgusting stereotype, and one that has been discounted by multiple academic studies. I thought you Ravenclaws were supposed to be all about your citations and sources."

"Who's stereotyping now?"

"Do you think Phineas would be advocating for the murder of all lycanthropes if his brother had lived?"

"But he didn't live," said Anson darkly. "They tore him to bits."

"And that's — that's horrible, and I'm really, really sorry. But what if he had lived?"

"Look, can we just go get dinner and forget about this?"

"No, we can't!"

"What do you want me to do, Lily?" demanded Anson, frustration seeping into his normally pleasant demeanor. "Choose between my best friend and my girlfriend?"

"No," said Lily. "I want you to choose between what's right and what's not."

"My God." Anson rolled his eyes. "It must get awfully lonely up there on your high horse."

Lily glared at him and he glared back. She felt like she was seeing him for the first time. They'd been having so much fun, but suddenly everything about him seemed silly and frivolous.

"If I were bitten by a werewolf tomorrow," she persisted, ignoring Anson's groan, "and I survived, but I had to live with lycanthropy for the rest of my life…would you kill me?"

"Oh, give me a break!"

"I want to know! If I were bitten tomorrow through no fault of my own, do you think I'd deserve to die?"

"You're so naive…"

"Answer the question, Anson. Would I deserve to die?"

"If you were bitten tomorrow," Anson snapped, with a surprising burst of temper, "and you lived, you'd be begging me to put you down. Any decent person would."

There was a long pause.

"You disgust me," said Lily, and there was no venom to her words, but rather a note of surprise. Then she fumbled with the clasp of her bracelet. "Here," she said, shoving the glinting silver jewelry into his hand. "I'll make this easy for you. You don't have to choose. I'm not your girlfriend anymore."