Written for the International Wizarding School Championship Season Three Round 7

School and Year: Mahoutokoro, Year 5

Special Rule: POV: Muggle Born

Theme: Write about a character hiding a secret about themselves.

Main Prompt: [Dialogue] "I need you to understand that I am not emotionally involved in this situation."

Additional Prompts: [Plot Point] Power cut, [Creature] Knarl

Word Count: 3536

When Lily sat down in the window seat of the Hogwarts Express for the seventh time in her life, she firmly believed there were two people she could always depend on – Petunia Evans and James Potter. They had never let her down, tirelessly working to find every single, possible, tiniest way they could to annoy her. But then James changed, or as he liked to say, he changed for her. Lily had never really hated James, as she had reminded him countless times. She had only thought he was somewhat immature, childish, unbelievably irritating, mean and arrogant; but she hadn't hated him… well, not a lot. He might have been a talented wizard, but there was always a part of Lily's subconscious which only cared about how he was as a simple person without magic. She supposed it was because of her heritage (or lack thereof), and she was grateful for it since it kept her grounded. But James changed once he became Head Boy. It was almost as if years of rejection from Lily had finally deflated his extreme self-confidence – to the extent that he asked her out only once a month, instead of twice each day as he used to.

And somewhere along the line – between exchanged glances in the corridor, countless dull meetings in each other's company and late nights studying in the common room – she started to realise she actually liked him back.

'Lily,' James asked her on a chilly winter night when they were doing their rounds around the castle after curfew. 'Will you–' He cut off, opening and closing his mouth in a hurry.

'Will I what?' Lily replied challengingly, knowing full well by the tone of his voice that he had been about to ask her on a date for next day's Hogsmeade visit. It was a wonder he hadn't done it sooner. She half-hoped he would.

'Nothing.' James shrugged. 'It's pointless,' he mumbled underneath his breath.

'I've never seen that bother you before.' Lily laughed, almost bemused at this side of her messy haired friend. Modesty had never been his strong suit.

'But it does bother me,' he finally muttered, almost ashamed, as he stole a sideways glance at her. 'Every single, damned time.'

It was such a simple, honest reply that it caught Lily off guard. James Potter of sixth year would have never said that; he would have never thought twice before opening his big mouth and explaining to Lily how lucky she would be to have a guy like him. The new, matured version didn't take her for granted, and Remus seemed to have finally managed to hammer some sense into his thick head. James truly had changed, and all of a sudden, that made him irresistible.

'James.' she said, stopping and turning to face her partner, and made a split second decision. She felt an inexplicable lightness envelope her. 'Are you sure it's... pointless?' He eyed her curiously as she stepped close… too close… and kissed him. It was as if a fire had ignited inside her chest as she felt James' firm arms surrounding her and almost wrenching her closer. It was over too soon as they pulled apart, gasping for breath.

'Wow.' James' eyes were shining with that old glint of mischievousness and energy that Lily found she had missed. That was all it took to snap her back to reality. The world came crashing down around her as it dawned upon her what she had done. Kiss James Potter – the one thing she had promised herself to never do. You utter idiot. Oh, the horror. No matter how good it had felt, what if it caused him to relapse back into his old self? What would it do to their friendship? What would her friends say? It was a nightmare.

'Sor… Sorry,' Lily found herself saying, before blushing a deep red.

'Sorry?' James asked with a frown. 'What for? That was amazing!' He looked searchingly into her emerald green eyes. Lily's mind ran in overdrive. She couldn't say it had been an accident, but she didn't want to hurt his feelings either. Merlin, this was hard.

'Nothing. I was… erm, feeling sorry,' Lily said in stuttering installments. 'For you.'

'What?' James was looking at her as if she was crazy. 'Why in the world?'

'You looked so sad, just standing there.' Lily bit her lip, trailing off. She knew it was a terrible excuse.

'So you kissed me because you felt sorry for me?'

Lily nodded apprehensively. 'Yes…?' It was almost a question. 'We can't tell anyone,' she added quickly. 'It's not like it was a proper kiss.'

Lily had lied through her teeth on that one, but she held her breath, hoping against hope James would agree. He stood there, considering it. Surely he wasn't as stupid as he looked. Surely.

'Okay.' James shrugged, pulling her in for a kiss again. It was every bit as good as the first one. She felt weak at her knees.

'I've waited so long.' James whispered, a small smile on his lips. 'I'll take what I can get.'

Even though she hadn't planned for the second kiss, it happened, as did the third, and the fourth and countless more. Everything happened at a breathless, frantic pace that had her aching to stop and insatiable for more.

'I need you to understand that I am not emotionally involved in this situation.' she told James at the end of every make out session in broom cupboards, empty classrooms, while patrolling empty corridors. They were stolen moments, away from the hustle and drama of school life – secret, perfect, little pockets of time – without the backlash she knew would have had to suffer from the majority of the Hogwarts female population if they found out she was sort-of-dating James Potter. She couldn't bear to think about how she would explain to Marlene that she had gone against everything she had stood for. And the Marauders would tease her endlessly. No, it was better this way, and she could always tell herself that the only reason she was doing this was because she felt sorry for James, and so he wouldn't irritate her anymore, and because he was an amazing kisser. That was it. No feelings involved. She was a smart, sensible person and the Head Girl – not a starry-eyed Quidditch-seeker fangirl.

Lily narrowed her eyes and focused. One clockwise turn. A pinch of rosemary mixed with the crushed shavings of wood from an Elm tree. Two counter-clockwise turns. Increase the heat. Wait for two minutes, and there it was. The perfect light magenta hue described by Libatius Borage in Advanced Potion Making. The scent from the bubbling, simmering froth of the potion rose up to Lily's nose and made her feel foggy and light headed. She quickly drew back, only to find herself in the shadow of her smiling potbellied teacher.

'Magnificent!' Professor Slughorn burst out in praise. 'A perfectly brewed Draught of Living Sleep.'

Lily flushed a bright red. 'Thank you, sir.' She always felt embarrassed when Slughorn singled her out for compliments, even when she was the first one to finish the potion.

'No, thank you, Miss Evans!' Slughorn pulled out a small vial from his pocket and carefully levitated some potion into it. 'It will bring a tidy price.' He patted the vial, now resting safely inside his pocket.

Lily frowned. 'Excuse me, sir?'

Slughorn smiled at her. 'Delightful as ever, Miss Evans. Now off you go.' He made a gentle shoo-ing motion with his hand.

Lily picked up her satchel and looked around. Most people weren't even close to finishing, and she wrinkled her nose at the dirty brown coloured potions. Didn't they know they were supposed to crush the wood, not slice it? James noticed her looking and winked at her, making her huff and turn away in annoyance. But inwardly, her heart skipped a beat.

She passed Marlene on her way to the door.

'This potion is a nightmare, Lily,' she whined.

'It's just like cooking,' Lily offered.

'I've never cooked in my life,' Marlene hissed at her. Most of the old pureblood families had house elves and it was no wonder Marlene had never learned how to cook. Lily apologetically shrugged as Slughorn called for the class to disperse. No one else had finished the potion.

'Why were you smiling just now?' Marlene asked her as she stood up.

'I wasn't smiling.' Lily protested, a bit too forcefully.

Marlene eyed her suspiciously for a moment before looking at the other side of the classroom at James, who was vanishing the puddle of mud which was supposed to be a potion. Marlene pursed her lips, and seemingly let the subject drop.

'Are we still meeting at half past eleven tonight for the Potions essay?' she asked Lily as they walked to their next class with Professor Binns.

'Of course.' Lily smiled brightly.

'Perfect.' Marlene smiled back just as widely. 'Don't be late.'

Lily inched her way down the stairs of the girls dormitories, feeling a bit uneasy at the absence of the usual noise and bustle of the daytime. She was exactly on time, as usual, but Marlene wasn't there yet, also as usual. The fireplace cast a homely glow around the empty common room and a faint smell of parchment and ink hung in the air – it was one of things Lily loved about the place. She sank down on one of the big, red stuffed armchairs and tucked back a strand of hair behind her ear. She didn't know what had her so much on the edge. Hopefully Marlene would be here soon. Lily shrugged and picked up a stray Charms book lying nearby to pass the time. She had barely leafed through a couple of pages when a surprised voice broke her out of her thoughts.

'Lils?' James asked, ruffling his messy hair as he strode in. 'Where's the rogue Knarl?'

'Rogue Knarl?' Lily looked up from her book. She hoped to Merlin that this wasn't another one of the Marauders' pranks gone wrong.

'Yeah.' James puffed up his chest. 'Sirius said there was a rogue Knarl in the common room and they needed me to hex it before it hurt someone.' He raised an eyebrow and roved his eyes up and down her slim form. 'I didn't know they were so pretty.'

Lily threw her hairbrush at him. 'I'm not a Knarl, idiot.'

'Ouch. Right.' he mused. 'He said it looked small and… scary?' He looked thoughtful. 'Are you sure its not–'

'Ouch.'

Lily had summoned her hairbrush back and thrown it at him with greater force this time.

'Fine.' James looked sulky. 'Don't help me. I'll look for it myself.'.

Lily wondered how the Marauders had convinced James there was an actual live Knarl in the common room. Oh, it was probably one of those times when they wanted to prank James' bed and wanted him out of the way. Lily felt like banging her head against the wall. Knarls were one of the least scariest creatures she knew – she thought they were kind of cute. It was a good thing James didn't know what a Knarl was. He was looking behind the tapestries, the clueless idiot.

'I took care of the Knarl.' Lily piped up. 'You don't need to worry.'

'Oh, great.' James looked crestfallen, as if he had been anticipating a heroic battle with the Knarl. 'Darn it, Padfoot!' He turned towards the staircase of the boy's dorms.

Lily panicked for a second – despite herself, she had been looking forward to spending some time with him. But she was not emotionally involved either, she reminded herself, hoping against hope it would turn true.

'James!' she raised her voice. 'Could you help me with this spell?' She held up the tattered Charms books she had picked up, looking at him expectantly.

'Really?' the messy haired boy positively bounced to sit beside her as the armchair lengthened itself to accommodate him. He was about to put an arm around her but a hasty 'James' from Lily had him withdrawing hastily. They had clear, well formulated rules for interactions in public – no staring, no touching and definitely no kissing. The common room was markedly dangerous territory, as the moustached painting of Sir Dimperly the Dimwitted looked at the two of them with great interest. Merlin, those paintings could gossip.

Lily was intent on preserving her secret, and if that meant they couldn't be affectionate in a mostly empty common room, then so be it. James looked at her with a mixture of incredulous disbelief and admiration.

'I don't understand this one.' Lily flipped to a random page of the book in her hand and pointed at it. There was nothing suspicious about asking the Head Boy for help with her homework. She surreptitiously shifted closer to James' side, causing a wry smile to tug at his lips. He looked at the proffered book for a while before turning to stare at the redhead beside him.

'This is a fourth year Charms book,' he said pointedly.

Lily was just about to explain it didn't matter when the lights went out, plunging the common room into complete darkness. The fireplace was extinguished, the lamps weren't visible and she could barely make out the tip of James' nose.

'Lily.' James said in a small voice, as she felt callused fingers clasp around her hand. 'What happened? Am I dreaming?'

Lily would have scolded him for his feeble attempt at humour, except for the fact that he sounded a bit nervous. Wait, was he… scared?

'It's just a power cut.' she told him, trying to free her hand half heartedly, but gave up on realising that no one could see them. She rather enjoyed the warmth and comfort of their intertwined fingers.

'What's… what's a power cut?' James asked, his throat dry and lacking the usual vigour.

'A power cut!' Lily repeated bracingly. 'You know, when the lights go out. It's probably a generator failu…' her voice trailed off as she realised that everything in Hogwarts ran on magic. A power cut shouldn't have been possible. She felt unsure for the first time. Was Hogwarts switching to a new policy of lights off after curfew, like the Muggle schools? Surely not.

'Gen–whatsit–ter?' James asked, not reassured in the least. 'Are we being attacked?'

'Of course not, silly,' Lily knew he couldn't see the fake smile on her face, but she smiled nonetheless.

'Lumos.' she heard James cast, but there was no familiar light to be seen on the tip of his wand. Now that was scary.

'It's the Slytherins.' James whispered into her ear, almost pulling her into his lap. 'I knew setting their beds on fire had gone too far–'

'What!' Lily was furious.

'And now they're getting revenge. Don't glare at me like that – it wasn't really fire, it just looked like it.'

'How do you know I'm glaring at you? You can't see me.' Lily protested.

'Now is not the time to discuss petty matters,' James said seriously. 'We need to regroup and form a plan of attack.'

'This is not a Quidditch match, Ja–' Lily cut off as she heard a scuffling sound somewhere to the right of her. It grew louder by the second.

'The Knarl!' James said with the same amount of fear as he might have said 'Dragon'. 'Sirius said their bite is poisonous and potentially lethal.'

'Nonsense.'

'He also said they can sense fear.'

'Shut up, James.' But Lily was suddenly very glad that she could hold tightly onto his hand for comfort. She couldn't deny she was far too emotionally involved for her own good, and she loved every bit of it. The sound of cloth being torn and something scratching its way over the rugs came to their ears. The hair stood up on the end of her skin. Knarls were little more than bad tempered hedgehogs – she had nothing to be scared about, right?

'If my time has come, I'm glad I could spend my last moments with you,' the fearless Gryffindor Head boy told her, pressing his lip softly onto hers. It wasn't a very salient excuse, but all coherent thought evaporated from Lily's mind. Just as things were about to get heated, a blinding flash of light shone into her eyes and the world spun around before coming sharply into focus. Loud voices filled the once again brightly lit common room. The world was full of colours once more.

'Hand over the money, Sirius.' Lily heard Marlene's smug voice saying, as she saw the two of them standing in front of the red and blue panels of the fireplace. Remus, Sirius and Pettigrew were nearby as well, wearing Gryffindor colours and as scruffy as ever. They were smirking at her and exchanging a disturbing amount of Sickles between themselves. Meanwhile, James was shaking his head from side to side like a wet dog.

'What's going on?' Lily raised her voice irritably. Nothing was making sense.

There was a pause in the excited chatter as Sirius smiled and sat down beside her on the arm of her chair. He gently patted her hair.

'Oh, Lily-flower,' he said condescendingly. 'Did you really think you could hide this from us?'

A feeling of dread trickled down slowly from Lily's head to the tip of her presence of the Marauders meant it had all been a massive prank! She couldn't believe it.

'What… how did you do it?' Lily felt her throat dry up.

'Simple.' Sirius looked like he was enjoying himself. 'You and Prongs had been acting suspicious for quite some time. So we convinced Marlene to help us and tricked both of you to meet in an empty common room. I snuck some of your potion from today when Sluggy wasn't looking and coordinated it so the two of you would feel its effects at the same time. The rest was just the two of you being… well, just what we had hoped for.'

For the first time in ages, Lily felt stupid. How had she not recognised the effects of the Draught of Living Sleep? A mild dose of the potion induced anxiety and made her eyes see only darkness, as if she was awake while sleeping. That meant the Marauders and Marlene had been standing there all along, looking at the two of them acting like idiots. Lily buried her head in her hands, overwhelmed with emotion. Now everyone knew about her and James. Her eyes felt slightly moist. She wasn't ready yet… she just wasn't ready.

'It's all right, Lil.' Marlene came and sat on her other side. 'We think you're perfect for each other. I think you're perfect for each other.'

Lily peeked out of a crack between her fingers. 'You do? Really?'

'Yes.' Her best friend pulled her in for a hug, instantly making Lily feel better. 'Someone needs to take care of James. I mean, just look at him.'

Lily looked in the direction of Marlene's finger, and instantly burst into a fit of laughter, rubbing away the stray tears from her cheeks. James had yet to properly regain his vision, and was stumbling around the common room like a blind troll, muttering 'Knarl' and 'Sirius, I'll kill you' in intermittent bursts.

'The poor boy.' Lily said, standing up and feeling a bit silly for overreacting. 'Someone needs to tell him the Knarl never existed, and that Sirius is right behind him. I'll–'

'Wait!' Remus interrupted her, raising an eyebrow and striding over to her side. 'Did you say the Knarl isn't real?'

'Of course it isn't,' she replied. 'You couldn't have possibly…' she trailed off on seeing Remus' solemn face.

'We take our pranks very Siriusly,' Moony said, 'we got one from the gardens and put it in the common room this afternoon. We have our best men working on finding it this very instant, now that it has served its purpose.'

'Caught it!' Pettigrew shouted from the corner of the room, holding up a spine covered, cricket-ball sized and scary red-eyed critter squirming in his hand. Lily didn't like the look of it at all – it was distinctly unlike the cute ones she was accustomed to. The Knarl suddenly leaped forward and dropped from Pettigrew's hand.

'It pricked me!' the forlorn boy exclaimed. Lily shrieked and joined Marlene on the armchair with their legs dangling far above the ground. James somehow found his way there as well, wriggling into Lily's embrace. They sat together in silence for a while, reflecting on how their secret relationship might change now that it wasn't a secret anymore. They had to confront its reality at last. James cleared his throat three times before gathering up the courage to speak.

'I'm sorry we couldn't keep it a secret, Lils.' he said softly into her hair. Lily's heart constricted – she knew he had never wanted the secrecy, but he had never complained. Her worries melted away into the warmth of his voice.

'Shh.' Lily comforted him. 'I'll take what I can get.'