Hi, and here is another chapter, I am leaving this note short and sweet this time so enjoy.

Disclaimer-Nothing is mine.

Please Read and Review.

Also as I said in the last chapter I am back at work now so updates might be a bit few and far between for a while.

The Beginning Of The End

Chapter 3-Foul Deeds Will Rise

James and Lily begin to get closer as they work together as Head Boy and Head Girl and Sirius and Marlene are rocked by an event that sees one Black brother pitted against the other.

Sirius Black eyed his timetable with increasing disgust.

"Ugh"

"Problem Padfoot?" Prongs said next to him adding copious amounts of sugar to his tea.

"Defence Against the Dark Arts is sill with the Slytherin's dammit you'd think that someone would learn that pitting us together never ends well. Well on their own heads be it"

"Not on their Head's Pads…mine. You know I think Dumbledore's master plan was to get me to be Head Boy and therefore get you in line"

Sirius and James looked at each other and then they both burst out laughing. Remus who had been reading over his timetable trying to memorise it in one go shot them both a look.

"Are you and Lily meeting for your head's meeting today?"

James shot his friend a dark look. He had been studiously avoiding thinking of the meeting between Lily and him today and he had instead been focusing on his hair. Why…why did his hair look fantastic most days and yet the one day that he needed it to look good it didn't? Why was this his life?

"Yes we are" he said quietly. "And I am prepared for it?"

"We know" Remus said sagely. "If a baby owl flew into your hair right now then it would get stuck there. That's how much hair potion you have. You know…there is rumoured to be a direct correlation between too much hair gel and male patterned baldness—"

James flinched. Having grown up in a family who made hair potions—to say nothing of coming from a family who had great hair, the words 'male' and 'baldness' were particularly traumatising for him.

"Don't say such things" he said finally before dumping another slice of bacon onto his plate. "And I am fine, all I am doing is having a one to one meeting with Evans in the joint Head's office. It is not going to be a problem"

Peter who was always later just sat that down in time then to hear the last remark and James looked up to see three pairs of eyes staring at him with three very different expressions.

Fuck this. He wanted more bacon.

Sirius had been having a nice day.

Okay it wasn't nice, for a first day it was okay. McGonagall had landed them with enough Transfiguration homework to sink a ship with and Charms was a nightmare from start to finish because Flitwick was uncompromising with the workload even when there wasn't the promise of a free period after words.

Remus had all but danced off to the library with his History of Magic essay and Peter had gone with him with an expression best suited to one heading to Azkaban. Sirius had been debating weather or not to head outside and soak in the sun or to head back to the Common Room when he smelt the familiar perfume of Marlene McKinnon who was suddenly there her blonde hair tied behind her in a curly ponytail.

Sirius thought she looked…well…he knew what she looked like and his hands itched for a second. Nerves was not something he dealt with and now suddenly he was nervous and he didn't know why. Marlene looked up and caught his eye and she smiled.

"Hey Sirius"

"Hey McKinnon"

Marlene gave a laugh and the noise shot straight to Sirius's…well…let's just say it shot straight…downwards and leave it at that.

"Sirius we've known each other since we were eleven, you can call me Marlene"

"Alright…Marlene"

"So I was thinking about—"

But whatever she was thinking about was drowned out by a high pitched scream.

Everyone in the corridor stopped dead but because Sirius was an idiot he pushed forwards to the sound and because Marlene was even more of a reckless idiot she followed him. Neither one of them had any idea what they were heading into but they went into it nonetheless.

It was a first year girl whimpering on the floor and standing in front of her his wand aloft was Rabastan Lestrange his twisted face a smile of pure malice. Next to him looking impossibly board was Regulus.

His brother Regulus.

And Sirius saw fucking red.

Rabastan raised his wand again and before the word Cruico was out of his mouth Sirius had fired a hex at his brother. Regulus saw it coming and deflected it with an almost easy wave of his wand.

"What the fuck?" came another voice and he saw Carodoc Dearborn push his way through the crowd his face twisted in disgust.

"She's first year Lestrange what the fuck is the matter with you?"

"She is a traitor" Lestrange spat his face twisted into an insanity Sirius hoped never to know. "A traitor to our cause and she like all the rest of you will suffer—there is no where that the Dark Lord in his infinite wisdom cannot find you and he will punish you if you not comply and—OW!"

"SHUT THE FUCK UP YOU INBRED BASTARD!"

That was it, Sirius was done, there was nobody else for him but Marlene McKinnon—he was in love. Totally and completely, head over arse in love. She had shot off a curse that had sent the bastard back knocking over a statue in the process his arm turning red with pain.

James would be proud.

Rabastan rebounded just as quick and then Sirius didn't know what started it. He thought he saw Ravi Patil pull the poor first year out of the mess but it was him and his brother and Lestrange and Marlene and Dearborn and everyone, Slytherins against Gryffindor's, Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs and it was a dirty, dirty fight but one that they had to win for reasons in that moment beyond his comprehension but would later understand was everything.

And so it began.

"So I think if we have the rota for the Prefects out after Quidditch trials because I know that the boy from Hufflepuff what's his name…Cattermole wants to try out then that should seem like a plan and—Ja—Potter are you listening?"

James snapped himself out of the daydream. The problem was a combination of Lily Evans, a hot room on a nice September's day and the terminal lack of interest he had in paperwork of any kind (as he had told McGonagall in his fifth year when she had kindly asked him just what he wanted to do with his life other than cause chaos) was making him rather sleepy. As of right now he was looking at the strands of Lily's hair (she had kept it loose today) and was trying to pick out all the different colours in it so that he could catalogue them later.

Sometimes James knew Sirius was right when he said he was a disgrace to the entire male species.

"Did you hear a word I was saying?"

"Err…I heard the most part"

She rolled her eyes at him and James smiled. For once she didn't make any of the one hundred and one comments that he thought she would have made but she smiled back. That was astounding. The smile and the reaction.

Lily put down her quill for a second and looked at him with those green eyes that made James want to do something exceptionally stupid. Like kiss her. Or profess his undying love.

So much for the whole trying to get over Evans thing.

"Potter…can I call you James?"

James she wanted to call him James? Merlin she could call him whatever she wanted and he'd probably still answer to it—actually he did.

"Sure Lily"

She nodded and then staring at her quill she spoke.

"I think…I think in Hogwarts this year…with what is going on outside…I think this is the year where we will begin to see things happening"

"Meaning?"

"Do you…do you think that there will be a war?"

James thought about it. He really did think about it. She didn't interrupt him but she watched him instead as he thought about what she had said.

It wasn't the first time that he had thought about it either. For long periods over the summer he had thought about weather or not the rise of these people calling themselves Death Eaters would actually come to anything and then one of them had killed a reporter at the Prophet, a junior minister to the Minister of Magic had come home to find his family all dead and the Dark Mark over their house. Giants had been seen in the West Country—though that had been described across all media platforms as a freak accident and there had been several mutterings in the Leaky Cauldron when they had gone to get their books that one time that the dementors were making it very clear (though how a dementor did that James honestly did not know) that they wanted more, more power, more souls to suck, more misery spread across the country.

He shivered involuntarily. He had only come across a dementor when in Defence Against the Dark Arts last year when they had been learning how to repeal them. They'd had time at the end of the year when it was clear their Professor liked to spend his day hiding behind great puffs of white smoke, that they could spend time choosing spells they wanted to learn and James had wanted to learn about how to repeal Dementors. He couldn't explain why…he just knew he wanted to.

But he realised that Lily was still watching him and he raked a hand through his hair which knowing his luck would probably make it more messy.

"I don't know" he said honestly. He didn't think he could be anything else when Lily was with him. That was half the problem sometimes.

But she was still watching him and he knew that he was going to have to give her a real answer. A real answer to a problem that was bigger than both of them that was threatening even now when it had not fully begun, to swallow them whole.

"If your asking do I think it's going to get a lot worse then yes." He said finally. "A war? I don't know but…but there has to come a point where some people stand up to him, Dumbledore for one, the Ministry and…"

"And you?" she asked tilting her head to the side and watching him for a second. James felt something shiver down his spine at her expression, it was nameless, faceless and he couldn't begin to describe when he thought of the men and woman up and down the country, witches and wizards who thought muggle torturing was fun and that was a class system of wizards and that Lily who was arguably the smartest, if not one of the smartest witches in their year, were decidedly second class.

"I choose the side that opposes Voldemort" he said truthfully. He knew his mother like many people didn't like to here the name unless she had to but he held no fear in it nor did he see the point of any fear in it. If you asked his opinion then it was stupid to fear a name, pointless…after all what did it do but increase the fear of Voldemort himself?

This was probably why Remus was the one best left to the armchair philosophy as his Dad used to call it.

He stopped that thought instantly. He was not going to think of his Dad right now. He was careful to choose the moments where it didn't hurt as much and thinking of Lily and his Dad and what he would make of the war made his heart constrict in his chest to the point where it became difficult to breathe.

"Thanks James" she said softly and James shot her a critical look before scooting his chair closer despite his better judgement.

"You really didn't think I would choose anything else did you?"

"No" Lily said smiling, "I figured that I knew you pretty well"

James paused. It would be so easy he thought, so easy to kiss her now. It was a bad thought and he wanted to scold it right out of his brain but his brain had spent a long time thinking of illogical, impossible (and as Remus told him downright illegal) ways of getting a chance to kiss Lily Evans so his brain didn't listen to him.

Neither did his heart come to think of it.

Lily looked at him for a long moment and she didn't pull away even as he moved forwards. He could count every freckle on her face and he was sure that his heart was going to stop and then—

BANG.

He nearly fell of the chair. The moment was ruined and James knew that today someone was going to die.

Whoever it was that had ended this perfect moment was going to die a long, slow and agonisingly painful death.

Lily jumped to her feet and the door to the Head's office opened. It was Cassius Bruce a seventh year Gryffindor who had just been made Quidditch captain and who had told James he was too good to even try out this year (not that James believed in favouritism—you had to earn your spot after all), he brushed his blonde hair out of his eyes in a way that made every fifth year girl go week around the knees even though every man and his owl knew that Cassius was not interested in the female sex whatsoever.

"You better come Potter" he said not looking remotely winded. "You too Evans"

"Why?"

"Black's going at it with his brother and McKinnon's gone after Lestrange and it's turning nasty"

"Why?" Lily said clambering to her feet.

Cassius bit his lip. "Because Black and McKinnon saw Lestrange torturing a first year"

Lily gasped her hands over her mouth and James felt a swooping sensation in his stomach.

"What happened?"

"It's Cleo Fox, you know whose father is on the Wizarding Wirelesses Network with that show? Well apparently he called the Lestrange family a bunch of inbreed whores and bastards populating the world with rancid offspring's who were a curse to the Pure-Blood World and like cockroaches they should be stamped out"

James snorted. He really couldn't help himself.

"That's brave"

"Yeah well…I heard that cockroaches were taking offensive to it but…anyway they started on her and Regulus Black"

James groaned because he could see where this was going and it wasn't good.

"Well he was just stood there doing nothing, course that set Sirius off and then McKinnon went into it as well. Dearborn showed up and tried to stop it but then then it turned into a full-scale duel with a lot of Unforgivable Curses flying around. Fenwick's there as well and it's turning nasty"

"Do we not have teachers in this place?"

"Course we do" Cassius said with an eyeroll. "But there all in Dumbledore's office for a meeting, which is six flights up, I sent Otis Ulick up there to get them because he's a runner but you were closer and both Blacks look prepared to do some serious damage and the Slytherins are there too"

"Shit" James muttered grabbing his wand. He didn't have to turn around to know Lily was grabbing hers. "Come on then"

When they got down to the first floor it was chaos. Up front Lily could see Sirius and Marlene. Sirius and his brother were locked in a contest so intense that it was hard to tell who was who, Marlene was duelling with Rabastan Lestrange whose face was twisted into a snarl. Caradoc Dearborn was attempting to help but he and Benjy Fenwick were trying to keep a furious Maximillian Nott away from the first years most of whom were cowering over a girl who was in and out of consciousness although a group of rather…enthusiastic ones seemed to be prepared to use what little magic they had learnt in a day to help.

Lily ducked as a red blast of light narrowly missed her and sent a charm to cover the first years. James had fought his way to Sirius though he was ducking curses himself. Lily shoved a Hufflepuff girl out of the way and elbowed Margarita Bullstrode in the face on instinct alone.

She got to James's side and was just about to open her mouth to ask what the fuck they were supposed to do to stop this…this insanity…when…

When…

And then…

It started like a whistle of wind but it got so loud and so high pitched that it made her scream her hands covering her ears. It wasn't just her. Everyone including the Slytherins were retreating and screaming as the high pitched noise pierced their eardrums. It made her slip on something as she fell to the floor bruising her already bruised elbow further trying to hide away from that noise that seemed to seep into her very skin.

Lily felt a hand take hers and she forced herself to her feet gripping it tightly. In her other hand was her wand but she wanted to drop it to cover her ears and it was only when the screaming stopped did she realise that she could open her eyes and it was when she opened her eyes that she could see what was in front of her.

Albus Dumbledore, flanked on either side by a row of teachers his wand high above his head, his face more furious than anything that she had ever seen before was standing before his students. Lily felt the hand around hers tighten and she smelt the smell of broomstick polish and almonds and peppermint and she knew it was James Potter, her once arch-enemy, now who knew who she was clinging to.

Everyone was silent.

Even the Slytherin.

"AND WHAT IS THE MEANING OF THIS?"

Dumbledore never had to shout to get his point across but he shouted now and it caused everyone to flinch.

Lily shuddered because she knew now at this moment without a shadow of doubt that whatever was coming next, it had begun.

And there you are, I hope you enjoy and I will see you next time.

Next Chapter-There are battle lines at Hogwarts, Dumbledore does his best to try and calm the waters and as the first Quidditch match comes around, Remus laments what must happen next.