The tension between the Marauders didn't ease, and soon Sirius became pretty much attached to Lily. They walked to breakfast together, ate breakfast together, went to classes together, sat in classes together, ate dinner together, hung out in the evenings together and only parted on a night just before they went to bed. This confused Marlene and Dorcas, who suddenly had to put up with Sirius being around them all the time. The other Marauders just tried to ignore it. Lily herself was increasingly wanting to find a way to put the situation right; they couldn't all go on like this forever. It was too weird! So she sat with Remus one evening when she found him alone in the library, after leaving Sirius to do homework alone in the Common room.
He was in a lonely corner, hunched over his work. His hair was getting quite long, and it kept falling into his face which he kept trying to brush away. Remus was totally in a world of his own, and Lily felt a bit bad for having to break him out of it.
"Remus."
He looked up from all the books and parchments strewn over the desk, placing his quill down on the desk. He could guess what this was going to be about.
"Hullo Lily."
She furtively took a seat next to him, turning to face him and apprehensively tucked a stray piece of hair behind her ear.
"I was wondering about you guys and Sirius. When do you think you'll all go back to normal?"
Remus exhaled slowly, mulling the situation over.
"I don't know what to tell you Lily; I need more time, and I think James does too." She looked at him questioningly so he continued, "I need to come to terms with the fact that he not only shared my secret, but also created a situation where I could have killed someone."
"That's not what I'm confused about, Remus. Why is James still so upset?"
Remus glanced back down at his abandoned work, wondering why Lily - someone so perceptive and understanding, could never understand James.
"Remember Lily, he was nearly killed that night too. He threw himself in front of a werewolf to protect someone he doesn't particularly like all because Sirius put us in that situation. Moreover, James has an intense sense of loyalty, and he hasn't taken well to the fact that Sirius told the one secret that was a core part of the Marauders. It makes it seem like he can't trust Sirius anymore, which he doesn't like at all."
Lily nodded. "I suppose. Sorry Remus, I just never thought of it like that. All I can see is that Sirius isn't getting any better, y'know emotionally, and I just worry about him."
Remus was surprised at the care she had for Sirius. Sure, this was Lily - but they had only been spending time together for a few weeks. He watched the girl sitting next to him. Her expression was clouded with anxiety and she was fidgeting, like she was trying to avoid Remus' gaze. He wondered whether what was happening would have an impact on their friendship.
"Look, I'll try," he said reassuringly, "It won't happen overnight but it will happen. You don't have to worry about it."
Remus knew he wasn't especially good at comforting; that was much more James' forte. So logically, he tried to think of what James would do in this situation. A thought jumped into his mind that James wouldn't actually be in this situation with Lily and if he was then him and Remus probably wouldn't do the same thing at all, but he quickly pushed that aside and softly placed a hand on one of the hands in Lily's lap.
"I'm sorry that you are so involved." Remus said sadly.
Lily smiled at him and squeezed his hand, "It's not too bad; it's a great opportunity to get to know you Marauders. It's funny, we've lived together for 6 years, but we're all still pretty much strangers."
He laughed, "And that is something I regret, but I don't think it is anyone's fault. What with you and James, and then Sirius' crazy personality sometimes, we'd all be an unlikely friendship at the moment." Remus had added the 'at the moment' because deep down he thought that they could all be very good friends, if only they would all give it a fair try.
"What?" Lily giggled, "Because your personality is so perfect?"
"Heyy!" Remus retaliated by letting go of Lily's hand to give her a playful shove, "I think us two could have been amazing friends from the outset."
She sobered slightly, "We still can be Remus; I would love for us to be friends, especially after all of this."
Remus flushed, and turned away from Lily to run a hand through his hair: a habit he must have picked up from James. He looked back at her, a friendly warmth in his eyes.
"I would like that too." He said sincerely.
"What are we all liking?" James said, as he leaned his arms on both of Lily's and Remus' chairs. Lily noted that his uniform looked dishevelled: his tie was loose and the sleeves of his arms were rolled up messily.
"Oh, me and Lily were just talking about stuff." Remus said as dismissively as possible, leaning back over his work.
Lily quickly tried to change the subject.
"Potter, have you seen Dorcas or Marlene?"
He narrowed his eyes at her curiously, obviously wanting to know the previous topic of conversation.
"Yeah, Dorcas is with Peter somewhere in here and I haven't seen Marlene."
"Hm," Lily wondered out loud, "that's strange; I haven't seen her either and I was back at the tower only 10 minutes ago."
James looked concerned, thinking back to the events of the past weeks. "Should we look?"
Lily shook her head as she stood up, "It's probably nothing. Marlene has got plenty of friends in other houses so she could be hanging out with them somewhere else in the castle. But thanks for the concern." She said and gave James a small smile. "Bye Remus, I'll see you later."
"Bye Lily," he said distractedly with a quill in his mouth, not looking up from his work which he had turned back to whilst James and Lily spoke.
She walked off to look for Dorcas and James watched her go. He felt like he was always doing that.
Marlene strolled into the Gryffindor Common room and spotted a lone Sirius Black sitting on the floor by the fireplace, unusually doing his homework on the small coffee table. Boy, something must be wrong.
"Hiya, Sirius."
"Hey, Marls."
"Whatcha doing?"
"Is it not obvious?"
She groaned, "I was obviously just trying to make conversation." Marlene plopped herself down onto the ground next to Sirius, and he shuffled up slightly to make room.
"I noticed you haven't been hanging around with the others so much." She said bluntly.
"Yeah…"
"There's been absolutely no pranks for the last few weeks."
Sirius looked up at her and let out a peal of laughter.
"That's what you were worried about?"
"Was there something else?"
He sighed and shook his head. "You, my friend, are never going to change."
"Nope, but you know what we can change? The lack of pranks. Come on," she said standing up and outstretching her hand for him to take, "Hogwarts needs some cheer and so do you."
Marlene dragged Sirius out of the common room, not noticing as he wistfully turned back to look at his homework still on the table.
"So, how do you boys come up with your pranks?" She said as they walked down the corridor.
"Well…it depends really. Sometimes it's just a thought we randomly having during the day, sometimes we brainstorm and sometimes it's just because we're angry with the Slytherins."
Marlene nodded along, "Hm, interesting. Well do you have any ideas right now?"
Sirius wracked his brains and looked at all the objects in the corridor. There were portraits - those could certainly be messed around with. What else? Knights, but it felt like the Marauders had already done everything possible with them. The other students? Nah, he wasn't in the mood to risk annoying people directly. Aha! He spotted had spotted one of the trophy cabinets, and an idea immediately waltzed into his head.
"How about," he said, a smirk tugging at the corner of his mouth, "We redistribute the trophies, if you know what I mean."
Marlene grinned at him, "Yes, I certainly know of a few people who deserve a trophy, or don't as the case may be."
Their hijinks weren't noticed until late the next morning, but it was very obvious when it was noticed. Students crowded the trophy cabinets all around the castle. There were laughs and there were groans, and there were cries of anger and outrage at Sirius and Marlene's impromptu award ceremony.
Longest gone without a shower - Snivellus Snape
The furthest up Voldemort's ass- Styx Avery
Winner of the 'most likely to be the cause of their own death award' - Mulciber (what is his first name? Oh who cares?)
The most luscious locks award - Sirius Black
Kindest smile - Lily Evans
Most badass- Marlene McKinnon
And so on it went, with a lot of the Hogwarts population now having their name on some sort of adjusted trophy. The notable exceptions were Remus Lupin, James Potter and Peter Pettigrew. Sirius hadn't known what to do for his friends because he didn't want to upset them in any way. So, as he was trying to change every single trophy, he changed James' Quidditch position from Chaser to Seeker on one of his trophies - a very tame way of completing the prank.
Sirius and Marlene were proudly sitting together at breakfast, when Lily and Dorcas came up to them.
"Should I even bother guessing who was responsible for last night's prank?"
The troublesome two laughed and high-fived.
"I'll take that as a no." Lily said resignedly as she sat down.
"Oh Lils, your copy of the Prophet came a few minutes ago." Marlene handed Lily the rolled up newspaper that an owl had delivered a few minute prior.
Lily served herself some breakfast and then began to read it.
Dorcas, Marlene and Sirius continued to chat about some nonsense.
"I appreciated my best hair-do award, guys." Dorcas smiled.
She had dark hair cut into a bob, which Marlene thought to be very cool. Marlene, as a witch from a quite traditional pureblood family, wasn't allowed to cut her 'gorgeous long hair', so she envied Dorcas greatly.
"It was only deserved!" Marlene replied, "you two have the best hair at Hogwarts."
Dorcas looked flattered at the compliment, but Sirius just shrugged and said; "I know."
They then noticed Lily, who's face had gone very ashen and she had stopped eating.
"Lily? What's wrong?" Dorcas asked concernedly.
Instead of replying, Lily just handed Dorcas the newspaper and then put her head in her hands.
October 21st 1975
The Ministry of Magic announced earlier this morning that any muggle-born wizard or witch will now be required to register themselves with the Ministry - a so-called Muggle-born Registration Act. This information will be openly available to the public, for use by employers and services. The Ministry has reassured that this information will not be used for unfair discrimination, and there will be punishment if it is.
Dorcas read this extract from the front page out, her voice becoming shakier by the word.
"This is so wrong!" Marlene cried, "Of course it's going to be used for discrimination, otherwise they wouldn't even bother collecting the information!"
Sirius nodded in agreement, "Exactly! I can't believe that they're allowed to put this into law."
"Are you alright, Lils?" Dorcas put an arm around her friend, and moved the red hair out the way so that she could see Lily's face.
"Not really." A muffled voice responded.
Dorcas looked worriedly at Sirius and Marlene, her eyes begging for their help.
"We'll do anything we can to protect you from this Lils, and prevent it from getting any worse." Marlene attempted to reassure.
Lily looked up, with small tears trickling from her puffy red eyes.
"I'm not sure there's anything we can do. We're outmatched. Merlin, this is so awful - muggle-borns get invited into this whole new magical world and it feels like an absolute dream at the beginning. But now- now we're being blocked out from it, after seeing what it could be like and, not only that, we're getting our lives put in danger." She became choked up, "I'm going to go, guys. I think I want to be alone for a bit, if that's alright."
They didn't know what to do as they watched her hurried leave, none of them could really understand her situation. Sirius and Marlene were, of course, pureblood and Dorcas was a halfblood, so they had all always been surrounded by magic. She walked by James, Remus and Peter in the door, who tried to stop her when they saw her tears, but she shrugged them off and disappeared into the castle. The three boys looked at Sirius, Marlene and Dorcas, who shook their heads.
"What was that?" James asked after they had walked over, "Why was Lily so upset?"
Dorcas handed him the newspaper sadly and the three Marauders gathered around James to read it.
"What?" James shouted.
"They can't do this!" Remus added.
"Poor Lily," Peter said sadly.
"We need to do something!" James restlessly ran a hand through his hair, clenching his other hand into a fist, so tight that his nails left little half-moons on his palm.
Dorcas sighed, "But what? We're just school kids and no one would listen to us over Voldemort."
"Bloody Voldy," Sirius muttered under his breath.
James thought for a moment, "I don't know! But we have to stop this persecution of people who are no less than us!"
Remus put a hand on his shoulder comfortingly, "We know Prongs, but we have to think logically. We're all as upset about this as you are."
"We should check on Lily." Marlene said, motioning for Dorcas to follow.
This left Sirius with the other Marauders. He desperately thought about following the girls, but came to the conclusion that he wasn't close enough to Lily to be with her right now.
"What did Lily say about the Act, Padfoot?" Remus asked, breaking the awkward tension.
"She was just upset and feeling a little hopeless, I think."
Remus nodded, wondering whether he should continue the conversation further. James was looking stony-faced and Peter looked nervous. Sirius answered the question for him by getting up.
"Well, I've got erm…homework to be going, so I'll see you."
He left, trying not to let the tears take hold. It was hard to be strangers with your brothers.
Lily was sitting on top of the astronomy tower. She wiped away each tear just as it was about to fall; she didn't want to be seen as weak, even if she was on her own. The wind whipped her hair around, hitting her with ice cold blasts of October air. Stormy clouds were brewing far off in the distance - dark shapes looming on the horizon. She thought back to her first night at Hogwarts. It had been totally clear, and stars twinkled brightly in the sky, smiling down at her merrily. She had just been introduced to the world of magic, and yet somehow she was still surprised by how magical it all felt. Early September evening warmth had kept the new first years toasty, covering them like a blanket from the outside world. Now she just felt cold.
The new Muggle-born Registration Act meant that Lily would never get to have a life in the wizarding world like any of her friends. She wondered whether it would be best for her to just return to the world of Muggles, maybe get a safe office job and live in relative security? No, she could never forget magic or just leave it behind; it was now part of her. Well, it always had been. She may not be from a wizarding family, but she sure as hell was a witch. With that in mind, she got up, ready to try and tackle the day.
Dear Mum and Dad,
Have you seen this new Muggle-born Registration Act? It's totally outrageous! I have a muggle-born friend (ish- the topic would be open for debate) here at Hogwarts and I hate to think how it would effect her now and in future. I want to do something about it. Do you guys have any contacts in the Ministry who would be able to help? Anyone would be appreciated. I was thinking about doing some sort of protest here at school, not anything proper but just a show of disapproval and unity from the students.
Hope you're doing alright,
Lots of love,
James xxx
James put his quill down, satisfied with his hastily scribbled letter. He hoped his parents would understand that he just had to something about it - whether it was dangerous or not. As an Auror, he hoped his dad would have some sway in the Ministry, and would hopefully know some people willing to talk to James. But for now, James would have to go to the person he trusted most here at Hogwarts with an issue like this.
"Come in."
James walked into Minerva McGonnagall's office just next to the Gryffindor tower.
"Mr Potter, what a pleasant surprise." The Professor said, looking up from her desk, "I'm not sure you've ever been in here voluntarily before."
The troublemaker smiled fondly around at the office, "What can I say, Professor, maybe I am growing up."
She shook her head, "Never. What can I help you with today?" McGonnagall gestured for him to take a seat on the other side of her desk and he sat down, looking her straight in the eye.
"Have you seen the new Muggle-born Registration Act?" She nodded grimly, "I want to do something about it, find some way of showing Voldemort that not everyone is going to stand for it."
She looked concerned, "Mr Potter, though I do commend you - is it wise to start publicly making yourself an enemy of Voldemort's? You're only 16."
"It's now or never, Professor."
Part of her just wanted to tell him to choose the never; keep himself safe and out of harm's way. However, she knew James Potter and knew asking him that would be futile.
"Well then, I don't know right now what you can do, but I can talk to Professor Dumbledore about it. If you have any ideas in the meantime, do not hesitate to talk to me. But make sure you do talk to me, Mr Potter, I don't what any of you doing anything stupid."
He nodded, "Yes, thank you Professor." His mind was already darting from idea to idea, and he wanted nothing more than to just get on with it.