His Greatest Wish, by AndromedaMarine
A/N: I know, these late posts are getting old. Literally. I'm sorry. In all honesty it's been laziness on my part to get this finished…well, laziness and accumulating schoolwork. I can't promise it won't happen again, but just in case it does…sorry. My motivation recently (resulting from events waaaaay out of my control) has been as elusive as the Blibbering Humdinger, and as hard to catch as the Crumple Horned Snorkack.
The Shift
He didn't hear it before it was too late, and Sev cringed as he felt the snowball impact the back of his neck. His shoulders hunched up and he tried to get the offending cold off his skin by jumping around, but some slid underneath his cloak and down his shirt. He yelped. "Lily!" he yelled. "Lily! What did you do that for?" The snow melted and Sev relaxed, turning around to attempt a glare at his best friend.
Lily stood several feet away from him, her gloved hands clasped innocently behind her back, her weight on one foot as she grinned at him. If Sev had forgotten any of his Slytherin habits he would've let his guard down. But he knew she had another snowball behind her.
"Do what?" she asked angelically.
He kept eye contact as he leaned down to scoop up his own handful of snow. Sev watched her closely as he packed it into a ball. Lily's eyes grew wide. "This," he replied as he hurled the snowball with perfect aim—it hit her smack in the middle of her back as she fled. She tumbled and fell, twisting so she landed face up. The snow was deep. Sev ran as fast as he could over to her and fell to his knees beside her, but before he could say anything he was met with the other snowball directly to the face. He sputtered. "Lily!"
She giggled and rolled away from him, gathering more snow as she went. "That was too easy," she called to him, scrambling to her feet. The snow stuck to every inch of her clothing. "You're a Chaser! I thought you had better reflexes!" With that statement, she hurled the next attack, but Sev ducked just in time. The snowball flew long over his head and smacked into a tree trunk.
"I do have better reflexes," he responded dryly, shaking falling snow from his head and tucking a strand of hair behind his ear. Lily stared at him. Sev kept his hair just long enough where it didn't look awful and she could barely remember when it was always a greasy mess. He had certainly changed for the better since before Hogwarts. "What?" he asked when she didn't say anything for a few more moments.
"Oh! I—I wasn't expecting you to move that quickly," she said unconvincingly. Sev had a sneaking suspicion that she was taking the time to study him, but he didn't address it. "You know," she continued, her cheeks red (and not just from the cold), dropping the snowball from her hand and brushing the dust off her gloves, "I could use a mug of hot cocoa."
The abrupt change threw Sev off for a fraction of a second. "Uh, yeah, all right," he said, his mind flying into gear. They walked away from the park and towards Sev's house, in synch but several feet apart. The snow crunched beneath their steps. They didn't say anything, and after several minutes the silence started to bother him. "Lily," he asked, "what's on your mind?"
She didn't speak for a few moments, trying to come up with a suitable lie. "Not much," she tried when she couldn't think of anything.
Sev stared at her. "You're an awful liar," he stated calmly, watching her face for a reaction and received one when he saw her cheeks start to color.
"Oh, I know," she agreed easily as she flashed a quick smile at him. "I was thinking that I should write to Alice and Molly when I get home tonight. I haven't written to them in a few days."
They turned into Spinner's End. Someone had cleared the sidewalk down one side of the street but not the other. "I've been thinking of trying to speak with Regulus again. I know he acted like a little twit when I approached him at the beginning of term, but I think he might be an ally down the road."
"Sounds to me you're thinking like an Auror," Lily said. "It's a good idea, I think you should, despite what Sirius says about him."
Sev wrinkled his nose. "I don't think I'm cut out to be an Auror, Lil."
"Oh, come on. That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard. You're better than the fifth years in Defense. You could take the O.W.L.s with your eyes closed and still get all O's."
"Hmm," he responded in a tone of avoidance. "I just don't think I'd want to work for the Ministry."
They reached Sev's house and he produced a key from inside his cloak to open the front door, since Eileen was in Diagon Alley at the shop. Once inside he peeled off his wet cloak and hung it by the roaring fireplace; Lily did the same. She spoke as she followed him into the kitchen.
"Well, whatever you do, I know you'll be great at it," she said with confidence in her voice.
Sev decided to change the topic as he put the kettle on the Muggle stove to heat up the water. He had yet to approach his mother and ask if he could use magic at home even though he was technically underage. Even though he had greater skill than his mother in the magical arts, if she hadn't given him her permission the Misuse of Magic Office would come swooping down on them within minutes. "Have you given any thought to what you might want to do when we leave Hogwarts?"
Lily shrugged and crossed her arms as she leaned backwards against the counter. "I've heard a lot about Aurors lately, but I'm not nearly as good with defensive or attacking spells as you are."
"You'll get so much better," Sev said with a chuckle that reverberated through his chest. "And besides, there are more possibilities of employment than just the Auror Department. I only know more because I grew up with a witch as my mother. Her old spellbooks were quite useful." The lie came easily but left a bad feeling behind his heart.
Lily let out a sound of mock frustration. "Merlin, I can hardly believe we're almost officially teenagers." The two exchanged a long look that ended when Sev couldn't keep a straight face. They both burst into laughter. "You know," Lily said once normal breathing returned, "I think you'd make an excellent teacher. You should teach the Seven how to defend ourselves. Merlin knows Peter needs all the help he can get—he's still being picked on by the Slytherins some of the time."
Sev's expression turned serious in less than an instant. "Me? Teach?" he said with disgust evident in his voice. I have sixteen years-worth of teaching under my belt. I hated every moment of it. "I don't think I could stand it."
"Even if it's just the Seven? It's not like you'll be grading us or anything. Dumbledore even said at the start of term that we should be diligent in our studies because of what's out there. And, you know, you taught me how to cast a Patronus."
The kettle began to whistle, Sev pulled it off the burner, and switched off the flame. He poured the boiling water into the two mugs full of cocoa powder, stirred it, and handed one to Lily. As the mug passed from his hand to hers, their fingers brushed, and Lily bent her face downward to hide a blush that rushed up her cheeks. She chided herself for reacting that way, justifying that he was her best friend and her body was therefore not allowed to react without permission from her mind. She had to train herself to hide it.
"Lily?"
Several minutes had gone by as she stared into her mug of hot chocolate, consumed in the whirling thoughts that maybe someday it could be Sev and her as something more than best friends. Lily started at the sound of Sev's soft voice reaching her ears. She looked up, her cheeks still a little pink. Her wide green eyes quickly became guarded, although she didn't even know what Occlumency was, much less that it even existed.
"Yeah?"
"I asked if you wanted to sit down."
"Oh—oh, yes," she replied, distracted yet again when he started walking back into the living room to deposit himself on the couch. After a few seconds she followed him in and sat on the opposite end of the worn, threadbare sofa, the mug clutched tightly in her hands. She glanced briefly over at him, giving a small smile when she saw that he noticed, and directed her attention back to the brown, chocolaty liquid swirling in her cup.
"You're awfully quiet," Sev commented before sipping on his own half-finished drink.
Lily balanced herself as she brought her legs up to her side and curled towards the middle of the couch. She rested the mug on her knee. "I'm just thinking about a lot of things. Something Mary Macdonald said got stuck in my head and I involuntarily decided to devote brainpower to it."
Severus stared at her. He wasn't sure whether to laugh or grunt noncommittally, because he honestly hadn't expected her to say something along those lines. I wonder what Mary said. "What did she say?" he heard himself asking before he knew his mind had approved the thought.
Expertly Lily clamped down on the blush that was rising to her cheeks again. "It's silly, really. Nothing you'd be interested in hearing."
"You won't know if I'm interested or not unless you tell me," Sev countered swiftly.
"It's nothing, really. I don't want to tell you." Then why did you mention it to him, you twit? Lily thought to herself.
"All right," Sev acceded quietly, taking another sip of the hot chocolate. It was nearing late afternoon and the sun was starting to sink into the west horizon. His mother would Floo home soon from Diagon Alley and start dinner, and depending on when Mr. and Mrs. Evans wanted Lily home, she wouldn't be leaving until well after dark. Christmas was in three days and Lily had been told by her mother to invite Sev and Eileen to Christmas breakfast and present-opening. She hadn't asked him yet.
"Sev?" Lily spoke after almost five minutes of complete, comfortable silence as they finished the hot chocolate.
"Hmm?"
"Mum and Daddy want you and your mum to come over on Christmas."
"Okay," he replied instantly. "I wonder what Petunia thinks of that."
"I wouldn't know. I haven't spoken to her at all since our fight last week."
"I imagine she's furious."
"She'll sneer at me or completely ignore me but she won't actually speak to me. Not that I've tried to get her to," she added quickly. "It's actually kind of nice."
"Petunia probably thinks she's doing you a disservice by keeping her tongue inside her mouth for a change. I think she hopes you'll eventually ask her to be on good terms again. She is your sister, after all, the only one you'll ever have."
Lily thought about that for a moment. What if Mum and Dad decide to have another kid? Would it be like Tuney, or like me? "I wonder if my parents will have another child," she said out loud to the air in front of her.
"Have they ever talked about having another kid?"
Lily shook her head. "Not that I can remember, but we're away at school from September through June. They've never put anything into a letter."
Abruptly Sev got to his feet and went to stand in front of the fireplace. His cloak was dry. He stared into the flames and once more the phantom pain pierced his neck, but it was just barely noticeable. "My hands are cold," he explained when Lily appeared next to him.
"Oh," she said, turning to stare into the flames. For a moment she considered taking his hand and rubbing it between her palms to warm it up, but the thought made her blush internally and question herself. She lifted one of her own hands to her neck, surprised to feel it was cold against her skin. "I guess mine are too," she said softly as she held her hands out towards the fire.
Regulus Black stepped out of his room at Number 12, Grimmauld Place, and closed his door with a soft click. He moved as quietly as possible to the top of the staircase and leaned over the banister, looking straight down into part of the front hall. His cousins, Bellatrix and Narcissa, had arrived thirty minutes ago with Rodolphous Lestrange, and Regulus's father, Orion, had told him to remain upstairs and in his room while an important meeting took place. Apparently for this visitor, a first year was far too young to be in attendance.
It was common knowledge now that Rabastan Lestrange was in Ministry custody for attempting to break into the Senior Undersecretary to the Minister's home, but it seemed as though the Ministry hadn't used any Veritaserum because nobody had come knocking at Grimmauld Place or any other Death Eaters' homes. They were in a state of tension, tension that Regulus could feel whenever he walked into his parents' presence. It was a blow to Voldemort's plans, yes, and Regulus figured that the Dark Lord would want Rabastan dead for letting himself get captured, and send another Death Eater to do it. The newly-branded fifteen year old wasn't worthy enough to be killed by Voldemort himself.
He couldn't hear any distinct voices from the third floor, but he could hear the murmur that accompanied the discussion of something obviously more important than him and his family. Walburga had turned up her nose in disgust when she learned from Regulus that Sirius was spending the holidays with Frank Longbottom. She detested Frank's mother and wasted no time in praising Regulus for being her good son who would go far in the Wizarding world.
Regulus wanted to obey his mother, but his curiosity was stronger than his fear of getting caught. Who could possibly be in their house that he must go to his room because he was only eleven? The most obvious guest would be Lord Voldemort himself, for why else would two ranking Death Eaters (Bellatrix and Rodolphous) be visiting? They certainly weren't here to interact with his parents. Bellatrix had oftentimes stuck her nose up at her aunt and uncle for their lower level of enthusiasm for the Dark Lord than her own. Narcissa, on the other hand, was quite the actress, and Reg wasn't sure if she meant what she said back at the welcome feast when he had insulted Lucius. Regulus knew that Lucius lived farther down on the spectrum than Cissa, closer to Bellatrix, since the Malfoys were power-hungry pure-bloods and Voldemort was a ticket to power.
The young Black wanted to know what was going on downstairs, but fear of punishment kept him from venturing any further down the landings. Disappointed, he turned and trudged back into his room, where a thought occurred to him. "Kreacher!" he called out, and the filthy house elf appeared with a crack.
"Master Regulus!" Kreacher croaked in his bullfrog voice. "What is you requiring of Kreacher?"
Regulus glanced around his room and towards the door before speaking again. "Can you find out who's here? And why they won't let me in on the meeting? Don't let them see you."
"Kreacher lives to serve Master Regulus," the house elf replied, a glint in his eye. He Disapparated with another loud crack and Regulus sat on his bed, leaning back against the wall as he listened to the silence that pervaded his room. A shiver went down his spine when it finally sank in that the Dark Lord himself might quite possibly be three floors below him, discussing attack plans with his parents and cousins and whoever else had arrived.
Kreacher reappeared almost a quarter of an hour later, eager to share what he discovered with his favorite Black. "He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named is here," the elf revealed. "Kreacher listened at the drawing room door, he did, and he heard talk of the new order He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named plans to put in place at the Ministry of Magic."
"Who else is here?" Regulus asked as he felt his throat go dry. He's going to take down the Ministry. "Who else, Kreacher?"
"Master's cousins, Mistresses Bellatrix and Narcissa, the Rodolphous Lestrange, Lucius Malfoy and his father Abraxus, and six others whose voices Kreacher could not identify." Fourteen people, a majority of them branded Death Eaters.
Regulus trembled.