Previously in the Darklyverse: Lily and James got married, and Lily and Alice both got pregnant.
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February 23rd, 1980: Lily Potter
If Lily had to pick which one of her friends would conceive or sire a child out of wedlock, she absolutely would not have chosen Alice. Honestly, she would have picked Marlene or Sirius, if only for their history of committing lots of sexual indiscretions with each other, at least before their breakup in seventh year. But Alice? Perfect Alice, prefect Alice, recovering purist Alice who believes in waiting? Not in a thousand years.
She can tell that Alice is just as shocked as Lily is—she's known as much since the day Alice told Lily she was pregnant, sitting there in Alice's flat with tears streaming down Alice's face. She was careful, she used spells, she took potions—there wasn't supposed to be any chance of this happening. But it did. It did, and Lily wishes desperately that she could take away Alice's sense of shame, because there's no use in Alice feeling so bad about herself for something that, frankly, Alice is in a position to handle effectively.
Because she and Frank love each other enough not just to stay together but to get married before they have this baby. Because they both come from well-respected pureblood families who will be there to support them, provide childcare, shower their grandchild in love. Because Alice is lucky.
Lily's not saying that this pregnancy is lucky, too, but she knows that Alice will make it through this and has no reason to feel like she's failed just because she's straying from the course she'd expected her life to take. She wishes Alice could see it the same way, but she doesn't, and Lily knows she can't make her, just as she knew it sitting at that kitchen table just holding Alice's shaking hands while her friend cried and cried.
If Alice had gotten her way, she and Frank would have skipped the ceremony altogether and just signed marriage papers at the Ministry, but Frank insisted on having at least a small celebration with family and friends. So here they are, Lily and James and the other Gryffindors, Frank's mates from Ravenclaw, and the bride's and groom's parents, all sitting in a circle around where Alice and Frank are standing with Remus, who is officiating. There is no one else standing up in their wedding, no maid of honor or best man, and Lily wonders how much of that was because Alice didn't know who among them was close enough to her for her to choose them.
Alice looks beautiful, though, standing there in a yellow dress with an intricate design of beads on the front and a tarlatan skirt that fluffs out all around her on the ground. The dress tries and fails to hide the baby bump that's just barely starting to peek out from Alice's waist. Lily would know: her own stomach is starting to show, and the Healers put her and Alice's due dates both within the last few days of July. She keeps telling Alice how excited she is for Harry and Neville (the names they've chosen for their sons) to each have a cousin to grow up with, for babysitting each other's children and going out to parks and playgrounds as one big Potter-Longbottom family, and Alice tries to act enthusiastic, but Lily can see the guilt in Alice's round face and doesn't know how to take it away.
After the wedding, there's a small reception at Helene's Manor—Lily and James insisted on hosting it there as a gift for Alice and Frank. Lily sticks close by Marlene and Mary and keeps an eye in particular on Sirius, who keeps looking over at Remus.
Inside, up on the second floor, Dorcas, Fabian, Rosalie Caprine, and Jaime Raywood are watching the orb so that hopefully they can manage any outbreak of violence on their own without interrupting the wedding guests. The reception runs late into the evening, and by the time Alice and Frank say goodbye, it's almost nine o'clock, long since dark outside thanks to it being February and the days being short this time of year.
"Are you worried about Alice?" she asks James when they're in bed, facing each other while holding each other's hands under their chins. "Because I'm worried about Alice."
"She'll be okay. Frank will take good care of her, and they'll both take good care of Neville."
"Frank and Neville aren't the ones I'm worried about. Alice has always prided herself on her propriety and her ethics, and I'm not saying it's unethical to get pregnant when you're not married, but Alice thinks it is. It's like—her whole identity is in question now or something."
"So they've done some stuff out of order. So what? She'll realize that Neville isn't going to be any worse off because of it, and she'll feel better about it," James reasons.
"I don't know," says Lily. "I think—"
Crack.
Lily and James look at each other. "Sounded like it came from downstairs," mutters James, and Lily reaches for her dressing gown. "Is everyone already down there who's supposed to be down there for orb duty?"
"Yeah, we weren't expecting anyone else—and we weren't expecting anyone to leave, either."
"We'd better go check it out, then," says James, and he follows Lily's example and grabs a bathrobe.
They're all the way down on the first floor when they find Dorcas, Fabian, Rosalie, and Jaime (as expected) sitting with—
"Professor Dumbledore," says James, sounding surprised. "What's—is there something going on?"
"There is," Dumbledore confirms. "Hello, Mister Potter, Missus Potter."
"Hi," says Lily awkwardly, shifting her weight from foot to foot.
James asks, "Are we waiting on the rest of the Order? Did you call a meeting?"
"Not yet. I thought it would be best to talk to the two of you separately first. Is there somewhere private where we can chat?"
"Uh, sure, this way," says Lily, and she leads the way to the nearest living room.
Dumbledore's face is lined with worry in a way Lily has never seen before, and he looks old, far older than he did when she stood with her fellow Order members in his office at the end of sixth year with Liz's and Millie's blood on their hands. "You may want to have a seat," he says, and Lily and James carefully sit on the edge of the couch and look at him.
Dumbledore bows his head, wipes his spectacles on his robes and puts them back again. "I'm very sorry to have to tell you this."
"Tell us what?" James demands.
Dumbledore looks up again and sighs. "I interviewed a young woman today for the position of Divination professor at the school. At the end of the interview—she made a prophecy."
Lily and James exchange a look. "I thought Divination was a load of tosh," she admits.
"And so it often is," agrees Dumbledore, "but Seers do occasionally make prophecies that come to pass, and I'm afraid that this particular prophecy will be self-fulfilling."
"Self-fulfilling how?"
"This prophecy concerned a child," Dumbledore says, "a child to be born at the end of the month of July this year, a child whose parents have thwarted Voldemort in battle three times thus far. This child is to be marked as Lord Voldemort's equal and has the potential to destroy him—or to be destroyed."
"Born in July? To parents who've evaded him three times? But that's…"
"Either your child," he says, nodding gravely, "or the Longbottoms'."
"Okay," says Lily, and she realizes that she's clutching her stomach. She lets go of it. "Okay. But this was during a private interview, right? So only you and the woman who made the prophecy are aware of its existence."
"I'm afraid… I'm sorry to tell you that the prophecy was partially overheard by a Death Eater who has reported the portion he heard back to Lord Voldemort, and Voldemort decided—he decided it must apply to your family."
Everything in the world suddenly feels smaller, narrowed down to the point of Lily's terror and anger. "What are we supposed to do now? And how do you know that the prophecy was overheard at all?"
"I think your safest option," says Dumbledore, "is to go into hiding. You know as well as I do that the Death Eaters have enjoyed playing with their food all this time, but faced with a threat to his immortality, Voldemort will likely try to exercise swift and brutal force against you, Lily, until you give birth, after which your child will become the focus of Voldemort's attentions. We can perform the Fidelius Charm to protect your location, but you ought to sell the manor and move. Your home here is public knowledge, and that knowledge can't be taken back."
"But why should we sell? Can't the Order keep using this place as headquarters?" asks Lily.
"Even though our using the manor as headquarters is under its own Fidelius Charm, that won't do anything to stop Death Eater attacks on the location where they believe that the two of you are hiding if you don't make it public record that it no longer belongs to you. Even selling it to another Order member might look suspicious. It's safest, I think, to move on entirely."
James's eyebrows are furrowed, and he's running a hand through his hair. "I'll get Sirius to do the Fidelius Charm with me. He would want to be Secret-Keeper. But you didn't answer Lily's other question. Who's to say that Voldemort knows about the prophecy?"
Dumbledore looks up at James, an apology in his eyes. "Because the person who told it to Voldemort confessed all this to me—what he heard, what he said, and what Voldemort thinks it means."
There's a stone on Lily's heart that starts sinking, sinking. "And why would any Death Eater do that?" she asks, afraid that she already knows the answer.
"Missus Potter, that Death Eater… was Severus Snape."
Dumbledore keeps talking, but Lily can't hear it. Sev, a Death Eater. She can't say she's surprised that her once-best friend joined Voldemort's ranks sometime after he and Lily stopped being friends, but to have it thrown in her face like that—for Severus to have been the one to tell Voldemort about the prophecy that would give him a death wish for Lily's son… It doesn't matter that Severus backpedaled when he found out Lily's life was in danger because of his actions; he had it in his heart to target an innocent unborn child and its family for what? To suck up to the darkest lord of all time? Like that ought to be Severus's goal in life.
James and Dumbledore make plans—Dumbledore will ask Sirius to sell the manor on their behalf and start looking for possible places Lily and James can move; they'll tell the rest of the Order what's happened and where Lily and James have gone after the sale is complete and the Fidelius Charm has been performed—but Lily can hardly follow along, given how mad she is about the whole thing. Severus Snape, a Death Eater. She should have bloody known. How did she not see this coming?
"Lily?"
She looks back at Dumbledore. "Pardon me?"
"I was just saying—if you're willing, Mister Snape has requested to meet with you."
"Not on your life," she says immediately. "If you'll excuse me." And she wraps her dressing gown tighter around her and stalks out of the room.