Author's Note: Sorry for the mispelled (misspelled/ mycpeled) words in this story. I'm typing really fast so I can finish it!
Chapter Fifteen- Voldemort
Lily didn't waste time going to the Gryffindor House where Becky and Doug were waiting for her impatiently. She wanted Soup and the other kids back as soon as possible. She went straight to Harry's office.
"Mars Bars," she told the gargoyle. He nodded and let her past. To the staircase, Lily said, "Make it fast, George. I think I know the cure," and then held on for dear life as George twisted wildly upwards. She stepped off onto the platform, dizzy.
"I need to get in, Fred."
Fred shook his head. "Can't let you in without permission, kid. Sorry, but that's just the way things are."
"Fred," Lily said firmly, only slightly imitating Hermione, "I know the cure. Now let me pass."
Fred shook his head. "Permission," he repeated.
Lily shook her head and then shouted "HARRY!" as loudly as she could.
Harry immediately opened the door and pushed his glasses onto his nose again. Seeing that it was Lily, he smoothed down his bangs. "What is it, Lily?"
"May I come in?" Lily asked, indicating Fred.
"Yes, of course. Come in."
"Permission granted," Fred said with an evil grin. He held the door open for Lily and closed it after she had gone in.
"What is it, Lily?" Harry repeated.
"I think I found a cure for the Twick."
Harry nearly shoved a paperweight shaped like an eagle off his desk. The eagle shrieked its protest and hopped back onto the papers it had been sitting on.
"A cure for the Twick?" Harry stuttered.
"Yes."
"What is it?"
"Well, you know how in your second year here, the Chamber of Secrets was opened and the basilisk came out and froze people?" Harry nodded. "You used Mandrake plants." Harry nodded again. "Well, Voldemort was obsessed with those plants- actually, a kind of plant that was a relative of theirs, the Quintessa. You know, it jumps a lot, likes to hide, looks like a perfectly ordinary plant but acts... like a... child..." She slowed down as she saw Harry staring at her. She took off again at warp speed. "In his biography in the library, it says that he found out how to use Mandrake to make people sick, too. He extended it to the Quintessa plants, because those are a lot harder to find and add flavor when you slip it into your victims' food. They eat so much of the plant that it becomes harmful. Anyway, all you need to do to heal them is mix the Quintessa plants with a Phoenix's tears." Lily looked beseechingly to Fawkes, who squawked his will to volunteer to donate tears. He shoved a bowl in from Harry's kitchen and immediately started pouring tears.
Harry watched Fawkes as he did all this. "How do you know all this?" he asked Lily.
"A book in the library. Don't tell, but it was in the Restricted Section." Lily briefly marveled at how she could tell Harry, the Headmaster, not to tell she had done something wrong. "There's another book in the library that says you're my father. I mean, I already knew, but it says why you had to give us up."
Harry cringed involuntarily. "I'm sorry about that. I had hoped you would be safe. Dudley would have kept you safe from Voldemort since Voldemort thinks I would never send my own children there. I had a tough time there, but I figured you would be okay. But my cousin, I hear, was worse than he was years ago..."
He looked at Lily, who was rubbing her wand.
She swallowed. "Right. I wanted to talk to you about that, too. Um. I was wondering... I mean, Voldemort has already found us, right? So it couldn't possibly hurt if we stayed..."
Harry thought and finally nodded. Lily released the gigantic breath she had been holding. Harry grinned at her. I'll call Ron and Hermione and tell them everything- the cure and the plans for you and James staying here. If they protest, I'll make Hermione ride a broom in front of the entire student body and make Ron clean the entire school without magic."
Lily beamed at him.
"You'd better go. Tell the kids in the school who are still here, and I'll get everything ready with the teachers, all right?"
Lily nodded. "Can I pack up my stuff, too? I don't have much, it's just that..."
"You want to move in," Harry finished for her. Lily nodded. "Trust me, I know the feeling. I'll drop by after I'm done here and help. I'll tell Malfoy to tell James, too."
"Thanks," Lily said.
Harry grinned at her. "Hey, I'm not the one who figured out the cure."
Lily blushed and set out. On the way down the hall, she saw Hermione and Ron nearly run into each other as they told the gargoyle the password and dashed up the stairs.
She started telling the portraits as she went about the cure, but didn't mention her moving in with her father. She was almost giddy with the thought. Finally! She wouldn't have to stay with the Dursleys! She was free at last! No more doing all the chores and the schoolwork. No more trying to hide from Pernella while her huge monster of a cousin chased her with her group of friends!
Lily heard a noise behind her which snapped her out of her trance. She looked around. She wasn't close the Gryffindor House yet. She turned to see if there was anything behind her. Her brow creased. She didn't see anyone. She looked at the stone statue of Wendelyn the Weird. From behind it, a shadow moved.
Lily jumped back and snapped her wand out of her robes.
James laughed. "Easy, little sis."
Lily relaxed a little and even lowered her wand a little- but just a little.
"What are you doing here, James? We're supposed to be in our common rooms."
"One: Supposed to be. Two: You aren't in your common room, either."
Lily lowered her wand and stood straight again. "I had to talk to Harry."
"What about?"
"None of your business." Lily, however, remembered suddenly that she and James were going to move in with Harry. That was James's business. "Actually, I told him that we knew he was our father. We're moving in with him."
James laughed. "I'm not moving in with him."
Lily gaped at him.
James sighed and looked at her as if she were a small muggle child who didn't understand she couldn't fly. "Lily, Lily, Lily," he said pitifully. He put his arm around her back. "There are still some things out there that you are too young for."
"We're the same age!" Lily retorted.
"Oh, no. You're brother and yourself are the same age, but I am much, much older."
Lily tried to draw away from James. What was her brother talking about? The arm tightened. After a few moments, Lily found that the arm wouldn't let her reach for her wand, either. She stopped struggling and looked at James. She looked at him and studied his face, eyes, stance, everything. His eyes were harder, older. His face was whiter. His stance was stronger, more certain. This wasn't her brother. "Who are you?" Lily asked slowly.
James, or at least the person holding her, grinned widely. "I," he said with a great air of dignity, "am Voldemort."
"Volde-" Lily shouted in shock.
She didn't finish the name.
Voldemort took out James's wand and said a word.
Lily didn't even know what had happened. The only thing she remembered later was that suddenly, all the lights went out. She was unconscious before she hit the floor.
* * *
"Okay," Harry began as the teachers in his office stopped talking and waited expectantly. Hermione and Ron glanced from Fawkes, who was still crying into the bowl, to Harry, asking for an answer although they spoke no words. Harry responded with a look that told them to wait.
"We have found an cure for the illness, which is also known for the cure."
The teachers, including Ron and Hermione, looked at each other like idiots. A few gasped in joy and surprise. A split second later, however, questions erupted from every corner of the room. "Woodrow," Harry said to Professor Nadim, "please go with Professor Hepatica and get together some Quintessa plants. Get some other teachers to help you brew those together with Fawkes's tears." Everyone looked again at Fawkes, who was now on his third bowl, still bawling nonstop. "Well?" Harry asked, looking at them as if they were idiots.
Immediately, everyone in the office made a rush for the stairs. "Ron? Hermione? Malfoy? Could you three stay behind, please?"
As everyone else left, the three teachers stayed behind. Ron and Hermione sat down in plush seats comfortably, only with a slight glance at the last teacher in the room. Malfoy swayed unconsciously on his feet, snickering slightly, but unsure of why he had been told to stay behind. The last time Harry had told him to stay behind for a talk, Fawkes had attacked him.Ron had entered the Great Hall flapping his arms ever since until a year ago.
Malfoy and Harry didn't have many private discussions.
Harry sat back down at his desk and looked at Malfoy in the eyes. "James is moving in with me tonight."
"What! Harry-" Hermione started as she jumped out of her chair.
Harry held up his hand to stop her. He was grinning slightly even as he made the announcement. "Lily is, too. She visited me today. She's the one who told me what the cure was."
"You believe a first year would possess that knowledge?" Malfoy sneered.
Harry nodded calmly. "You have to admit, Malfoy. Lily hasn't made one mistake yet. She's smart. She's memorized those books- at least that's what I've heard..." He looked at Malfoy over the rim of his glasses, a move which never failed to tick Malfoy off. He seemed to be looking for confirmation. Malfoy nodded slightly, glaring at all of them.
"Plus, she looked in his autobiography."
"That's against the rules!" Malfoy cried out. "That book is in the Restricted Section!"
"Yes, but I think we'll have to be a bit lenient, seeing as how no one else thought to check the book."
"And why should they?" sneered Malfoy. "That book doesn't have any information we don't know in it. I've looked through in. Some others have. There was nothing in the book to-"
Hermione's brow was creased. She interrupted Malfoy. "What did the book say?"
Malfoy grinned and chuckled maliciously. "It was a joke. It said, 'Born on a day, killed many, but never died.' I flipped through every page, and each page said the same thing- except the last one."
"What did that say?" Hermione asked anxiously. Harry and Ron exchanged glances, knowing that Hermione must be onto something and not wanting to break her chain of thought.
"It said, 'Try and get me.'"
"Lily said-" Harry stuttered, determined to say that Lily had been telling the truth. Malfoy must be lying! He must!
Hermione glanced at him. "You're going to hate me for saying this, Harry, but I think Lily was tricked."
"How so?"
"Voldemort probably possesses the book. He enchanted it, that's for sure. I'll bet he told Lily the right cure. That's how he is when he wants something."
"Wants something?" Ron repeated.
Hermione nodded. Malfoy's eyes became jumpy and rested on Harry at brief intervals before springing around the office again as the realization dawned on them.
"Harry," Hermione said softly, "Voldemort's trying to kill you. Again."
Harry settled back into his chair, grim. "Hermione, Malfoy, get James here. He'll probably try to take either James or Lily as bait as he did with Ginny. Ron and I will get Lily."
Hermione for once managed to hide her disgust at having to work with Malfoy and nodded. Malfoy did the same.
Ron glared at them. "He already has James- Don't you see?" he asked them irately.
"What?" Harry asked.
"James. His character changed, remember? When we met him, he was just like Lily. And then when we went shopping in Diagon Alley, he changed. He became vain, arrogant, cruel, plotting- Everything that Voldemort was."
The others stared at him blankly, another, deeper, more awful realization growing in their eyes.
"Don't you see?" Ron shouted at them. "He's been here the entire time. He's IN JAMES!"
"Hermione," Harry rushed. "Are you sure Voldemort gave Lily the right cure?"
Hermione nodded. "He wants you right now. Once you're out of the way, then he can start with the muggle-borns and half-bloods."
Harry nodded. "Right. Hermione, Malfoy, go and get James. NOW!" he shouted as them as they hesitated. They disappered from the office in a rush, screaming at George not to stop and make them fall or else Hermione would blow him to pieces.
Harry looked to Ron. "We've go to get Lily," he said desperately.
Ron nodded. "We're in trouble, Harry," he said matter-of-factly.
"I know," Harry said as he started running.
By the time they reached the Gryffindor House, their faces were red, and they were out of breath.
The Fat Lady looked at them, shocked.
"Please," Harry told her. "Has Lily been in here?"
"Lily? No. She hasn't come out, either, though. I think she's still inside." The Fat Lady opened the door behind her and gestured for them to go in.
Ron thanked her as Harry dashed through.
Only Doug and Becky were in the room, bored and on the point of falling asleep.
"Where's Lily?" Harry nearly screamed at them. They jumped.
"Uh," Becky began. Her mind, however, had frozen. She had never seen Harry scream. Or shout. Or even yell unless he was cheering for the Quidditch teams.
"Where is she?" Ron asked, much more calmly than Harry.
"She-" Doug attempted, but he couldn't find any lie to cover up for the fact Lily had gone to the Restricted Section of the library in the shape of a spider.
"It's important," Harry begged them.
Ron explained about Voldemort.
When he was done, Becky swallowed. She explained about the Christmas gifts from Harry- the Invisibility Cloak (Ron had glared at Harry, surprised, and then had understood, or at least seemed to.). And then Becky explained about Lily's plan and Becky's gift that enabled her turn into a spider herself. Doug and Becky hadn't seen her since the end of the Banquet.
Harry stood in the common room, in shock. James and Lily! How could he have let this happen to them? He should have seen!
"There is one other thing," Doug said after a few moments. He seemed surprised to hera himself speak when everyone turned to look at him. He cleared his throat nervously. "Those papers to my mum. They were to her and... someone else."
He looked at Ron, Harry, and Becky.
"Those letters were also to Voldemort."