Classes, Animals, and Cowards
Ginny walked into the quiet library. The rest of the school would be returning the next morning, and she wanted to get her books out before then. She set a pile of books up on Madam Pince's desk.
"I would like to return these please."
As the librarian started to check them all back in with their cards, she started to take note of the titles. "I see you are interested in the history of Helga Hufflepuff."
"Yes Madam. There are some other books I would like to check out. They are on the book list, but I didn't see them on the shelf last time."
"I am guessing you are talking about books with titles like, "The Descendant's War Prophesy", and "Famous Prophesies of Hufflepuff."
Ginny nodded. "Yes, yes I am."
Madam Pince sighed. "Funny, you look just like her too."
Ginny's eyes grew wide. "Lily." Madam Pince nodded.
"That would be the one. About fifteen years ago she was in here just like you, checking books out on the same subject. Then all that unfortunate business happened and she ended up leaving the school. There's no way a book left the school grounds, they are warded against it, but I never found them. She must have hidden them away somewhere. Not that I blame her, she was a very sweet child. Always returned them just as nice as they were when she borrowed them."
"Did you search for them, Madam Pince?"
"From top to bottom of this castle. I've been here a long time; I know most of its secrets. But she must have known one that I didn't."
"Thank you!"
Ginny ran out of the library. She had been looking for the wrong thing. She knew very well that Harry hadn't started looking for the statue yet. That statue had to somehow lead to this room. And only Harry would be able to open it. And Lily was able. That would be where the books were. That would be where the answers were. The answers that Harry was afraid of, the answers she somehow knew he needed for something.
Draco looked in the mirror of his room. He slowly curved his mouth into something that resembled a smile, and then cringed. He reached into the secret door that was hidden behind the mirror. Out of it he pulled a container of cream, which was the exact shade as his skin. Carefully, he applied it to his black eye. The skin soaked it in, and it looked just like normal.
He turned away from his reflection in disgust. "Trust father to get drunk the night before I leave," he muttered. The bruise on his back would never be seen. He left his trunk for the elves, and walked out of the room.
As he was heading for the front door, he passed Kindy.
"You be going, Master Draco?"
Draco would have smiled, but he knew it would hurt. "Yes, Kindy. Tell everybody thank you for me."
Kindy looked down at the floor in embarrassed pleasure. "You needn't thank Kindy, Master Ice Dragon."
"Where's my father?" Draco knew they never used their pet name for him unless there was no way Lucias would hear.
"Master Malfoy sleeps with a hurt head."
"Hangover. I don't think I'll hang around for him to wake up. Leave him a message for me, would you?"
"Kindy will do anything, Master."
"Tell him I will write if I make any progress."
Kindy tried to hide her face, but a house elf's emotions were always clear as day. "What ever it is, Kindy, just say it."
"M-Master Ice Dragon has a good heart. He will not let an- anybody takes it away from Master Ice Dragon. Kindy hopes." She turned, and ran down the hall.
"I order you not to punish yourself for that!" Draco hated to disappoint them. But there was nothing else he could do, not with the friends his father had.
Christmas ended way too early for Harry. Everybody would be back within the hour. He sat up with a yawn. Ron was already sitting awake in the bed over, staring straight ahead and grinning.
"Ron, are you still not over it?"
Ron looked over at Harry. "I can't get over the fact that my plan worked so well."
"What, that she didn't find out?"
"No, no. I spent three months being sickeningly sweet to her to build up that fight. Oh, it felt so good!"
"The fight or the kiss?"
"Both," Ron said with a smirk. "She's so fun to fight with, Harry. Her cheeks get red, and her eyebrows lower, and she glares. It's great. She likes it too. That's why I tried for so long to be so horribly nice. It made Christmas perfect."
Harry smirked at his best friend's face. "Ron, you're sly enough for a Slytherin."
Ron grinned, and sat up to start getting out of bed.
Classes started the next day. On the way to Harry's first class of Transfiguration, he was having a very silent, and very violent, fight with himself. In the end, he finally agreed to start looking for the statue that night.
Falling into his seat in Trans., he glared at the text like it was the book's fault he was afraid of what his dead father had told him in his sleep.
'Yes, AFRAID. A F R A I D. I said it. I'm scared. There it is. Coward. You call yourself a Gryffindor.'
"Welcome back, class. As you may remember, you were all going to be signed up for some new classes after Christmas break. Now, these classes may have students from any year, four and up. I will give you a paper on each class you have been signed up for. The paper will include the time and day you have the class, the teacher you have it with, and who your classmates will be. These classes rarely have above ten members."
McGonagall passed out the papers. Ron ended up with four, Hermione six, and Harry seven. "Your schedules from here on out will be flexible. Your classes may change from year to year, or even month to month. You will always be informed ahead of time."
Harry turned to his papers. The one on top was Advanced Transfiguration, taught by Professor McGonagall.
In this class you will be tackling some of the harder forms of transfiguration, including self-transformation, and the transformation of others. Even though this is taught in seventh year, it isn't tried, and only in this class will it be graded.
Harry scanned the list of his classmates. He recognized some of the other members as older students. The two names he recognized right away were Hermione's and Malfoy's.
The next class was the Parenting class. Heather taught this one.
They call this class parenting, but that is only one of the things we will be learning. A more appropriate name would be "Life class". Despite what your other teachers tell you, there is a life after school. You will be learning some necessary talents in order to survive out in the real world.
This class was made up mostly of people in Harry's year. Both Ron and Hermione's names were on the list.
Heather also taught advanced Defense against the Dark Arts.
Anybody who wants to look into a life of defending the world against the Dark Arts should take this class. Learn the curses that you may someday have to defend yourself against.
Both Ron and Hermione were in this class with Harry, but it was Malfoy's name that surprised him
Professor Flitwick taught advanced Charms.
Learn some of the more powerful Charms and new spells. We will discuss the differences between charms and spells, and about how the way to make charms was lost.
Hermione, Ron, and Malfoy had this class with Harry too.
Professor McGonagall and Heather taught dueling.
The dueling club was unfortunately discontinued. Since this may be an important skill in later life, we have agreed to start a class. The class will teach you the rules and regulations of a duel, and in the end we will be having a competition.
Harry grinned as he saw that the same three people had this class with him, and also Dean and Seamus.
The next paper was on Advanced Curses, taught by Snape, Flitwick, Heather, and Dumbledore. Harry read this description with interest.
In this class, we will be learning some of the most difficult curses, spells, and offensive and defensive charms. Tests and grades are not given in this class; your only objective will be to learn as much as you can.
There were very few people in this class. Two seventh year Gryffindors that Harry knew by name only, one seventh year Ravenclaw, and Malfoy. Harry swallowed once before turning to his last paper.
Survival. That was all it said, besides that it met on Thursdays from three to five and was taught in Heather's office. There was no class list. Thinking it a mistake, Harry raised his hand.
"Yes Mr. Potter?"
"This class, Survival, there's no class list, and no description. Something must have gone wrong."
McGonagall's lips thinned. "No, nothing is wrong."
"But then I have it all by myself." When McGonagall didn't respond, Harry realized that he was right, he did have it by himself. Suddenly the word Survival took on a whole new meaning.
"Surely you wouldn't object to having your God parent teach you some extra things."
It was Sirius that was teaching him then. That was why it said in Heather's office, but not that Heather was the teacher. "What extra things will I be learning to help me survive, Professor?" Most of the class was looking up form their own papers to see what was going on.
"You'll be learning a number of things. Defensive spells, mostly. But some of the more, ah, advanced attacking spells."
'More advanced? Then the one's I'll be learning in Advanced Curses? What is more advanced, besides the killing spells?'
The thought was like being dropped in cold water. He wanted to scream, to shout all the things he couldn't say. But he couldn't say them, not aloud.
So he switched to Parseltongue. "I can't believe you people!" he hissed, standing and glaring at Professor McGonagall. "I'm fourteen! But that's right, why train somebody to seek him out and kill him, if we can just train the one he's after to kill him when he gets here! Didn't anybody think maybe I don't want to kill him? Maybe I don't even want him dead. Maybe I don't even hate him!"
Then what he had said reached his own ears. He sat down with a thump, and stared into the air. 'Not hate him? Of course I hate him! How can I not hate him! He killed my parents! He killed all those children. He almost killed Rose!' That thought exploded with anger, just barely controlled. But that was what it was, anger, not hate. Never hate.
"Mr. Potter? Mr. Potter!" Harry's attention was suddenly jerked back, and McGonagall was trying to talk to him.
"Yes Professor?"
She blinked at him. He had been talking to himself in another language for the past moment, and had switched back to English so fast that it made her blink. "Would you like to inform me what you have been hissing about, or would you rather keep it to yourself?"
Harry stared at her long enough to let her know that he didn't intend to answer her question. Then he asked one of his own. "What if I don't want to learn?"
Professor McGonagall blinked, her mouth opening once, and closing again. "P-perhaps then you should speak to your teacher then. You, you will not be forced to, of course. We can always sign you up for another class. I'll talk to Dumbledore-"
"I said what if, Professor," Harry interrupted. He glared at the desk for a moment before looking back up at her. "I don't want to, but I will."
Professor McGonagall's intelligent eyes pierced through him. "If you wanted to, Harry, we wouldn't let you."
The class was thoroughly confused, but nobody offered them any information.
It was almost a relief to walk into Potions. The potions they had been working on would be ready today. They would get to test them. Everybody was excited to see what they would turn into.
"The potions are ready," Snape said in his sour voice. "Because of the danger of this potion, they have all already been tested and all of them work, there's no risk of it going wrong." Snape seemed rather put out by this. "Each of you will come to the front of the class, and drink a vile of your own potion. This potion will not actually turn you into the animal that you would be, but rather portray that animal around you. Brown, you first."
They were rather entertained for a while, watching their classmates turn into various animals, sometimes rather embarrassing animals, such as when Neville turned into a small brown bunny. Or when Dean and Seamus both turned into raccoons.
When Hermione was called, Harry couldn't help but sit on the edge of his seat. This was doing a very good job of cheering him up, even if it was Snape's class.
Just as Hermione was about to drink the potion, there was a knock at the door. Heather didn't even wait for Snape to open it to come in. "Oh, good. I didn't miss anything. I told my class to go have fun so I could come see this. I know you don't mind Severus."
Snape very apparently did mind, but Heather ignored the glare he gave her very well. Hermione downed the potion in one large gulp. A light surrounded her. The light then started to change, and it formed a kind of double image. When you looked one way it was Hermione, but when you looked another way it was a brown owl.
Ron ginned. "That is so Hermione."
"I have to agree," Heather said as the owl that was Hermione tried to turn its head all the way around. After a while, the image around her faded, and she walked back to her seat.
"Draco Malfoy, you're next."
Malfoy picked up the vile of his potion. He examined it for a moment and shook it hard before sipping it slowly down. The image that formed around Draco was much larger then the boy himself.
"A dragon," said Heather, looking interested.
"Not a pure breed though," Ron said standing and walking a little closer. "He looks like a mix between a Swedish Short-Snout and an Opaleye. See the silver scales, that's a Short-Snout. But the eyes are an Opaleye. But it's possible he's a really small, really light colored Opaleye. If I could see the flame I would know."
The dragon image that was Draco glared at Ron, and blew fire at him. The fire was a bright purple, and as it was an image, didn't even warm Ron. "Yes, he's a mix. An Opaleye has bright scarlet fire, and a Short-Snout has a bright blue. When they interbreed, which has never happened in the wild since they live in different areas, the fire is purple."
"So much for Malfoy being a pure-blood," Harry said with a smirk. The image around Malfoy faded and he glared at both Ron and Harry.
"How is it that you know so much about dragons, Weasley?"
"My brother, Charlie," Ron replied. "You'll be happy to know Malfoy that neither dragon is violent or known to attack people. In fact, the Opaleye only kills when it's hungry."
"A magical creature," interrupted Snape, "is a rare thing for a wizard to turn into. It requires a very powerful wizard." He beamed at Malfoy. "Congratulations, Mr. Malfoy." With Heather in the room, Snape couldn't get away with putting the Dream Team down. So instead, he boasted Malfoy up.
When Ron walked up to be tested, Hermione grabbed the leg of the desk to squeeze. Harry smirked at her, then turned his attention to Ron as he swallowed the potion. The double image showed a small red fox, and Harry grinned. That really was Ron. Long, fast, sly, smart, and cunning. In fact, if Ron weren't so brave and had such a good heart, he would have made a good Slytherin, if good was ever a word that could be used to describe a Slytherin.
They went through the whole class, and only Harry was left. It was just like Snape to save Harry for last. When his name was called, Heather jumped up before he could.
"Harry, I know you have more then one vile of potion. I trust your potion making, so can I try it? We never got to do this potion. I know Severus doesn't care."
Harry nodded, and Heather walked, or rather bounced to the front of the room. Ginning at Snape, she drank the vile of potion.
Around Heather appeared the image of a dolphin. It was easy for Harry to recognize it as Heather because it had the same intelligent, yet mischievous glint in its eyes. The Heather dolphin waved its tail at Snape, who rolled his eyes.
"Won't you ever grow up?"
The image faded and Heather shook off the side effects. "I don't intend to, know. You're only thirty-three, Severus. Live a little."
Instead of walking back to where she had been sitting, Heather jumped up to sit on Snape's desk.
"Just a little information for you all, as I'm sure Severus didn't tell you anything but how to make it. If any of you ever do take the step of becoming an animal, never drink this potion again." She giggled. "The effects are interesting to watch, but not any fun to experience, I'm sure. Also, you might notice when you get older, and stop changing every three days, the animal you turn into and you will share a mark. Something that can identify the animal as you. Such as Professor McGonagall has the marking around her eyes when she turns into a cat that look just like her glasses. You may already have your mark, if you have something that won't change even as you age."
"And how is it that you know so much about this, Deleve?"
Snape knew very well how Heather knew so much, and so did the Dream Team. Harry's back stiffened, but Heather didn't miss a beat.
"That's Heather to you, Severus. You don't see me going around calling you Snape, do you? The reason I know so much about it is Lily, really. She was afraid of what happens when you turn into animals. So in her seventh year, she did all kinds of research on it. She thought that the knowledge would erase her fear. But her real fear was not turning into an animal, but what she herself would turn into. She must have thought she would become something really horrible. But that year, James was teaching here. I had him brew some of this stuff. She never forgave me. James held her down, and I poured it into her mouth." She giggled. "Then James made her swallow." Snape stood leaning against the wall, his arms crossed and staring at the floor. But if one cared to look very closely, a very slight smile could be seen on his face.
"What did she turn into?" Harry asked as he refilled the vile.
"A unicorn, with bright green eyes. They usually have light blue or gray eyes. Your father took it too, and he was a stag." Harry smiled.
"Well Little Man, your turn." The nickname made Harry pause, and he wished he could say something to her about it, but couldn't because there were people around. Heather always called him a number of things, such as sweety, sweetling, honey, hon, love, and various things. But only Sirius had ever called him Little Man, and he wondered what had brought this on. It didn't bother him; in fact it made him feel good that Heather saw him as a Godson like Sirius did.
Even if Snape hadn't checked all the potions, Harry was confident in his potions skills. He drank it down without a problem.
It was a strange feeling. Something was reading him. It was seeing even things he didn't know were there, and once it read those things, it still saw no reason to enlighten him of what they were. It searched and searched, but didn't seem to find what it was looking for.
Harry was getting worried. The light had appeared as soon as he had swallowed, but nothing was happening yet. Then an image started for form. It was a large snake. Its scales were olive green, with a black zigzag pattern down its back. On its head, the pattern started with a lightning bolt. When he opened his mouth, a set of fangs appeared and somehow he could feel that they were poisonous. Harry blinked, and so did the green eyes of the snake. That wasn't what he expected.
Then it image started to change again. It grew larger. The green became gold, the black red, the scales fur. It was a large golden lion, with a scarlet mane. The tip of its tail was also scarlet, and so was the lightning bolt on its forehead. Harry blinked again, which also blinked the green eyes of the lion. This hadn't happened to anybody else.
Then, it started to change again. This time the animal didn't touch the ground. It was a swan-sized bird. The feathers were scarlet. The tail had several very long golden feathers that looked like they would almost get in the way when flying. The talons and beak were the same gold color as the tail, and very sharp. On its scarlet-feathered forehead there was a golden lightning bolt. The only creature Harry had ever seen like it was Fawlks. He was a phoenix.
But the image didn't stay still. It went back to the snake, then the lion, then again to the phoenix, the lion, the phoenix, the lion, the phoenix, the snake, the phoenix, the lion. After what seemed like forever, the image reluctantly settled on the phoenix, but would flash suddenly to the lion, and every once in a while, the snake.
The class didn't speak as the image started to disappear. It was Heather who broke the silence. "Well, Harry. I guess you have multiple personalities. I've never heard of a person with more then one before. Congrats, I guess. One was a magical animal too. The phoenix is one of the most magical creatures alive. It must take a lot of power to do that."
Harry shook of the uneasy feeling the potion left him. Like something had looked through him and seen everything, and didn't like what it saw. "It doesn't feel like multiple personalities, Heather, but rather like pieces of me are different, and it couldn't decide which piece was the real me."
Heather's eyebrows lowered in thought. Then an interesting look crossed her face. She covered it quickly with a grin while she hopped off of Snape's desk. "Well kids, it's been fun. I have to go. Tata Severus, Paul sends his regards."
Snape followed her to the door, and then slammed it behind her before turning back to the class. "Go clean up."
Harry was still trying to shake off the weird feeling the potion gave him when Ron came up as hit him on the back. "Harry, when are they going to give you a break? Nothing ever goes right for you."
"The fates are against me, Ron. They really are."
When they returned to the common room for the evening, Hermione and Ron told Ginny all about what had happened. When they told what Harry had turned into, Ginny grinned. "I told you, Harry. I was right on everything that I said."
Harry thought back for a moment to what she had told him, and then shuddered. "It kind of scares me that you know me so well, Rose."
"What are you guys talking about?"
"The other day, we tried to figure out what we would be. Ginny described what she thought I would turn into, but it didn't make any sense because the characteristics didn't fit any one thing."
"Like I said he would be gold, red, and green. The lion is gold, the phoenix red, the snake green. I said he would be something brave, the lion, but cunning and sly, the snake."
"You said I would be something large, which could be the lion or the phoenix, but could sneak around, and that could be the snake or the phoenix. You said I would be something that flies, the phoenix, but grounded, the snake."
"I said you would be smart, which could be all three, but also dense and easily blinded, and that could also be all three. I said you would be loyal, and that could be the lion or the phoenix, but proud, and that would be the phoenix."
"Well, next year, we'll see if you're gold, shy, powerful, smart, small, good-natured, and if you can fly."
Sally moved over and hissed something in Ginny's ear. Ginny's eyes went wide, and she covered her mouth with her hands. She snorted into her hands, and then burst into laughter. "Sally! You are so bad. That was mean! Sal!"
"What is it? What did she say?" But Ginny didn't answer; she shook her head and kept on laughing. "Oh, come on Sal, what did you say about me?"
"I wasss jussst sssaying that-" Ginny clamped Sally's mouth shut.
"No, no, no."
"Ginny, come on, now I really want to know." Sally pulled away and dodged Ginny's attempts to grab her again.
"I wasss sssaying that all three of your animalsss have a very long tail, and what that mussst mean about you."
Ginny's laughter came back in full force. The color drained out of Harry's face, and then was quickly replaced with bright red. "Sally! That's so horrible! I- I can't-" but Harry was over took by laughter too.
Hermione was relaxing against Ron on the couch, and looked up at him. "Did you notice that nobody thought to inform us?"
"Something tells me, Books, that we don't want to know."
Harry crawled very quietly out of his bed into the dark dorm room. He opened his trunk, and pulled out the map and the cloak. Trying not to wake anybody, he slipped out and walked down to the common room.
Just as he was about to pull the cloak on, a voice spoke behind him. "What are you doing here, Harry?" It didn't scare him. It didn't even startle him. He didn't think her voice would ever be able to scare him.
"I could ask the same about you, Rose."
He turned to look at her. She was looking at the floor. "I knew that you hadn't started looking for the statue yet, so I was going to do it. Please don't be mad at me."
"Mad at you? Once again, here you are saving my arse. What would I do without you?"
She looked up at him and grinned. "You would be dead. Do you have the map with you?"
"Here," Harry said, sitting down on the couch. He opened it and activated it. Ginny sat down beside him to read it. "Were you going to go out there without the cloak or the map?"
"Well, I couldn't do anything else. I couldn't ask you for them because then you would know and be mad at me."
"Rose," Harry said seriously "look at me." She looked up at him, rather startled by his grim expression. "I will never be mad at you. I might get upset if you do something I don't like, or be angry when something happens. But I will never be mad at you. Understand?" Ginny nodded wide-eyed. "Good. Now, what are we going to do here?"
"I've been talking to Heather about the map. She helped them make it. It's a mind map, it reads the minds of every person on the school grounds."
"I had noticed that."
Ginny kept going. "That's how it know when the passwords change. Because somebody in the school knows. Or did know. See, it has a memory. If nobody knows about it now, but somebody used to, then it still knows. It also self updates, when new things are built or discovered."
"Then how did my dad keep that room off the map if it reads minds, not the rooms."
"Heather said it's really complicated. You have to convince your mind to block it. You can always block a mind reader if you are stronger then it, and want to block it. The map is not very strong. But you have to block that one thing, and never let it go. But I don't get why he did it if only he and Lily could get in."
"Maybe that's not true. Or maybe he didn't want people to even know where they were, not just be unable to get to them."
"Could be. Alright, show me all the lion statues." The map started to change. Bright red ink sprouted up on various places.
"That's a lot of lions," Harry said looking at them all.
"It's one of the school symbols. Let's get started."
As long as they watched the map, there was no need for them to wear the cloak, but they brought it with them just in case. The first statue was right down the hall.
The came up to it. It was a sleeping lion at the corridor where the stairs to the Gryffindor tower started. It was probably supposed to symbolized the house's sleeping quarters. Harry wondered why he had never noticed it before.
"Now what?" he asked Ginny.
"We are going to have to use process of elimination. It's supposed to test your blood. Let's think what that could mean."
"Wouldn't that require blood, and something to test it? Then, wouldn't it make sense if there was something for me to cut myself with?"
"That's a good idea. It also would be a statue that doesn't move if it's guarding an entrance." Ginny looked to the map. "Only show the lions that don't move."
More then half of the red dots disappeared, including the one they were standing at, but there was still a considerable amount. "This is going to take a while."
Ginny and Harry had completely crossed off six of the statues before the decided to go back to bed. The started walking toward the common room again, and saw no reason to be silent as there was nobody around.
"I have a new class with Sirius coming up. I'll ask him if he can give us any hints."
"That should help. I'll talk to Heather too."
"Hey, how's your reading coming?"
"The books I need are missing."
"Missing?"
"Yes, and your mother was the last one to have them out. I think she left them in the room. I think the statue leads to this room."
"That's what I think too. I had no idea about the books though."
"Well, that's why I decided to stop looking for what couldn't be found, and start looking for what could be. It's kind of funny that we started on the same night."
Harry stopped walking, and Ginny turned to look at him. "What is it?"
He was looking at the floor. "I'm really sorry. I keep saying I wish you didn't have to be involved in this, and then I go and let you do everything. It's just something about this room. I have a feeling, that it's going to change everything, and I don't know if it's going to be a good change or a bad change. It's going to answer all my questions, and now I don't know if I want the answers. I guess, I was just scared. I'm a coward."
Ginny walked over too him and smiled. "Harry, you're not a coward. Being afraid does not make you a coward, it makes you afraid. It's not doing anything about it that makes you a coward. And here you are, doing something about it."
"Only because of you."
She shook her head. "You were going to do this before you even knew I was coming. I had nothing to do with it. It was all you. You're not a coward. Now, I am. There's something I've been afraid of as long as I can remember, and I still haven't done anything about it."
They started walking again. "What?" Harry asked.
Ginny looked up at him, a small smile on her face. "Maybe I'll tell you someday. Ask me again next year."
Harry didn't say anything else, mostly because he was trying to figure out what was wrong with him. He had another feeling. But this one didn't scare him like the other one did. This one was strangely intoxicating. It was on the very edge of his mind, but he didn't know what it was.
(A/N:
Draco: Lily, you are so obvious sometimes.
Me: *Smiles sweetly* I know. Now, wasn't there something that you wanted to say?
Draco: Oh, right. *Clears throat.* Please stop giving Lily reviews telling her that you hate the idea of Ginny and I being together. Trust me, we hate the idea too. My heart is reserved for another, whom you have yet to meet. We thank you for your concern-
Me: BUT YOU ARE ALL GETTING RATHER ANNOYING! I keep telling you that it won't happen, and trust me, I know. Please stop pestering me about it. This is a H/G! I'm giving some of the plot away right here: Ginny and Draco NEVER get together romantically. There, you know.
Draco: *Glares at Lily.* As I was saying, we thank you for your concern, but would appreciate it if you stopped telling us about it. Thank you very much for reading, and taking such an interest in Lily's story that you are worried about the characters. And thank you for reading.
Me: Yeah, thanks for reading! It's summer! If there is a lull between when chapters come out, it probably means I'm on holiday w/o a computer. Or Fanfiction.net is being an arse. Luv you all!)