Lily, the Vampire Slayer
A/N: Thanks for all the great feedback! Okay, on with the story.
Chapter Five
She leaned her elbow on the armrest of the chair which she had been offered and wearily looked on as the Watcher guy, Quesnel, explained all the crap about what being the Slayer was about. Same old, same old. Boring.
"Isn't that right, Lily?" Quesnel asked.
She sure as hell wasn't listening to the conversation that was definitely about her. Well, not exactly her, but Slayers in general.
"What's right?" she asked, not the least bit interested.
"That you are genuinely sorry for insulting Professor McGonagall and the way you acted."
She looked at him with an expression that clearly stated 'Are you drunk and are those horns growing on your forehead?' on her face as she said, "As if! You so wish!"
"Lily!" The Watcher was surprised. He had heard that most Slayers were difficult and that this current one was of the hardest, but he never knew she would be this austere. She had no respect for authority figures and seemed uncontrollable.
"Stick it up your ass, ya prick!" She said, flippant, slamming her feet onto the Headmaster's polished wooden desk.
"Slayer! How dare you-"
"See here, bub," she growled taking her feet off the table and leaning forward in her chair. "I'm just the Slayer to ya. I can be replaced, I got no importance to anyone and I've got no reason to live 'cept for killing some demons and hell spawns. You don't care if people hate me or if I drop outta school or get deemed as an illiterate. So, drop the 'I'm Mr. Rogers and I care' façade and stop acting like you care. I sure as hell don't, why should you?"
"I-"
"Fuck off," she stated simply and calmly as she got up and left the room.
The Watcher looked at the now closed door then turned to face the Deputy and Headmaster and gave a sheepish shrug.
"Only her Watcher could control her, unfortunately, the Council refused to send him with her."
"And why is that?" Professor Dumbledore asked.
"He has gotten too close to her. His emotions deter him from making the right directions. He cares more of her safety than the safety of the innocents she is to save. A Watcher should not take the Slayer's well being as a priority. Slayer's are invulnerable and they can be replaced."
Dumbledore shook his head at this man's close-mindedness and trained way of thought.
The poor girl.
***********************************************************************************
She stormed her way through the hall, headed for the library. She seriously needed to catch some more zzz's but she couldn't get them in her room. The over-powering stench of four different brands of perfume that so did not mix well, four giggling girls and the squeaky helium induced voices.
So she entered the next best place, the Library.
It was so quiet in there that you could probably hear a pin drop.
She took the table closest to the back and got a book from the shelf behind her, seemingly trying to study but burying her head into the book, hiding her face.
And she slept.
Then the dreams resurfaced.
***********************************************************************************
She was walking. Had been walking endlessly for what seemed like an eternity. Walking through a blizzard. Always walking. She looked down and saw her bare feet bleeding. Bleeding from the cold. It spilled into the pristine white snow and formed beautiful patterns across it.
She was captivated at the sight of her own blood and what beauty it could create.
The blood formed faces in the snow. A perfect replica of a people that she had once known. She remembered. She grieved. Sorrow and anguish and the feeling of…helplessness.
The two images floated into the air and stopped. Bright, white-hot light shone from the space from where the forms had once been.
Visions ran through her brain.
A father.
A mother.
Two young girls.
Basketball.
Fishing.
Late nights by a fire.
Good night kisses.
Love.
A family.
Then the beautiful phantasms ceased.
They were replaced by a show of terror, fear, remorse, regret and anger.
The way the demon had killed her parents and left their lifeless corpses on the entryway of her house.
The time she and Petunia had stumbled upon them.
Petunia's hysterical screams and accusations.
The trauma and shock they had been through.
The time Petunia had refused to take her in.
The bittersweet revenge she had obtained.
The invisible scars she had as a remembrance of those times.
The day the world had ceased to exist around her and when she had encased herself in a world of her own grief, anguish and fear.
The pathetic excuse of a human being she had become.
The vengeful monster she now was.
And then for the first time since the day the world had stopped, she let the tears fall. She let herself feel again. The scars opened once more and she didn't do anything to stop them. The tears had finally ceased after she had wept for what seemed like a lifetime. She let the wounds close up and she banged her hands onto the snow, looking up into the sky.
"Wretched excuse for a Slayer," a taunting voice came from behind.
She whirled around and glared at the thing she saw.
A scarred and scaly inhuman face stared back at her, mocking her with its yellow black eyes as a savage grin spread across his mossy brown face, accentuating his sharp and misshapen fangs and nose-less face.
"Is this the warrior that the world has sent me?" he continued to ridicule her. "A worthless little crybaby? One who is tortured by visions of a past?"
"Who do you think ya are?" she got up and faced it. "You have no right to judge me!"
"I am the one that you have been warned of. I am Donn."
"So, I guess it's time for lightning to strike and the earth to shake and the rain ta start pourin', right?"
"We shall meet again Slayer."
Then he raised his hand and knocked her back into a rock. She felt blood trickle down her forehead and lips as the figure disappeared.
***********************************************************************************
"Miss Evans, wake up!" Someone whisper-yelled as they shook her.
Lily suddenly bolted up and glanced at the certain individual. Her hair was done up in a bun, must've been all the lady teachers' dress code, had glasses, again, another dress code for all the teachers and had this concerned but angry look plastered on her face.
"Yeah?" she asked, staring at the old lady, it was then that she noticed that a lot of people had crowded around the table in which she had fallen asleep on.
"What?" she barked at the curious observers.
"Miss Evans," the lady gasped. "You're bleeding."
"What?" she asked, then she ran a hand across her lips, remembering her dream, and stared at the blood that tainted her pale skin.
She reached up to her temple and felt a scar and blood running from it. She stared at the blood once again, mesmerized, "Donn."
"Excuse me?" the librarian, asked.
"Uuh, nothih'. I'm fine. Must've banged my head on the table," she told the librarian, then turned to face the crowd, "That's it, y'all hear? I banged my head, that's why I was screaming." She turned back to the librarian, "I was, wasn't I?"
The librarian nodded.
"Right, 'kay."
She turned back, and seeing that the crowd had yet to disperse, she asked the librarian, "Can you tell me where books on Mythology are located? More specifically, Irish Mythology?"
"Four shelves down, on your left."
"Thank you."
She walked towards the appointed shelves and came face to face with balck and his lackeys.
"Had a wittle nightmare, Evans?" he taunted in a baby-ish voice.
"Not compared to the one you'll be having if ya don't get outta my face," she said sweetly, cracking her knuckles for emphasis.
"You don't want to do that, now would you? You are outnumbered."
"Oh, but I can kick your ass with my eyes closed and one hand tied behind my back, now do you need another demonstration, right here with all your friends to witness your embarrassment? If it's fine with you, that's sure gonna be great for me."
"I'm not here to fight you, Evans. My friends and I were here reading and we just wanted to see what you were doing."
"Well, since you asked so nicely, I'm here ta do some research."
"You actually do research? From what I heard, you're failing all your subjects."
"Well, haven't ya heard? Gossip's bad for ya, Black," she crossed her arms over her chest and continued, "And, me oh my, surprise, surprise, you can read?"
He stood there trying to find a suitable retort to her diss but before he could speak, much less think, she shoved him aside.
"Excuse me, I haven't got a lifetime for your thought process to register my words, so excuse me, I got some serious looking to do."
He looked back at her figure, which was now across him, fingering old volumes, trying to decide if he should throw another insult her way but decided against it.
"Let's go, Remy," he said jauntily as he pulled his friend towards the exit. "Oh, and you too Petey."
"And what about Jamesie?" Remus queried.
"Oh, let's leave loverboy. Give 'im a private moment with the tiger."
He pointed at James, who was still staring at Lily, as if lost in his own little fantasy world.
Remus shook his head as he exited the library, grimacing a bit as Sirius pulled on his arm harder. He glanced at Peter who gave him a sympathetic look as he, too, was once a victim of Sirius' over-eagerness.
***********************************************************************************
"What're you looking for?" he asked out of the blue, staring at the black-clad form, devoid of any color except for the beautiful red of soft and shiny hair.
"Nothing that concerns you."
He sighed. It was so hard to strike up a decent conversation with her without being put out by a single retort.
But he was James Potter and he wouldn't back down until he got what he wanted, her.
He didn't know what drew him to her. Maybe it was the way he didn't fawn over him like so many countless others had done. Or maybe it was her sarcasm. Ironically, he found it amusing. And the fact that she was a constant enigma.
Why was she so mean? What made her act that way? What had happened to her? Did she even feel? Did she have emotions?
He knew the answer to the last question.
She did.
He saw anger, the emotion she usually displayed for the whole world to see and…hope. He was her hope, it lasted for about a second but it was there.
The emotion he saw the moment they met.
It was a mere glimmer in her deep green eyes and it was gone before he could register it then, but after all those dreams and being haunted by those eyes every single moment of his being after looking deeply into those pools of green.
He couldn't believe it at first, but he was falling for her. Falling for, as Sirius and Cassiopeia put it, an insensitive bitch or a feral tiger.
Not that he would get anywhere with her, though. She was too tempestuous for his taste. He was quite accustomed to girls who truckled him and did everything he asked. Falling for a girl who he had already kissed was sort of required, too.
So, the emotions he had felt towards her, he placed under the brotherly concern category.
So he once again ventured into dangerous terrain. Determined to help her.
"Do you need any help?"
"No, if I did, I would ask."
"Are you sure? You're quite new here and I don't think you might find what you are looking-"
"Found it," she said stony faced as she held up an old leather bound tome. "You can cut the crap and leave now."
"You want me to go?"
"I wouldn't be askin' ya to if I didn't. And it's not you, well, it is you and your little fan club. Both of yer kinda, not just kinda, but way annoying, so, can you leave? I won't ask so nicely next time."
He smiled at her and she smiled back.
'God, it was such a beautiful smile,' he thought.
Her face then returned to its expressionless state. She walked up to him and shoved him. "I told ya to get out. And no," she answered, sensing the repartee he was to throw her way. "I don't own the library, but there are lots've other tables you can go and occupy."
"Well, I happen to have an attachment to this particular table."
"Well, I happen to not care."
"All right, I know when I'm not wanted."
"Finally. And, oh, before you leave-"
He walked up to her and he whispered into her ear, almost kissing it, "You do know you'll need human contact sooner or later. I don't think you can go living life alone."
He felt her stiffen then whisper back.
"But I can. So don't go assuming things you have no idea about. And as I was sying, before you leave, take your stalkers with you."
She stepped back and looked into his eyes and bestowed him with her trademark mirthless smile due to the shocked expression on his face.
Such a heartbreakingly beautiful smile.
But still, no one had ever turned him down the way she did. She was certainly a challenge. And he loved challenges.
"I will leave you for now but when you come to your senses, I'll be waiting."
"And you know, in some countries that's considered stalking?"
He smiled and left, a bunch of giggling girls in tow.
***********************************************************************************
She rolled her eyes at both the mindless drones and James Potter. He was the first, well maybe second to Black, undead person she had met that was so full of it and way too cocky for his own good.
And the giggling and drooling entourage he kept didn't do his ego any good either.
She couldn't tell what those bimbos saw in him, he was butt ugly. Well, not really. He had those warm chocolate/toffee brown eyes. And the way he kept his hair. It was tousled but had some sexiness to it. And that smile, and those soft lips of his.
'I wonder what it would be like to…, snap outta it! That's why you should never find anyone attractive, Lily Evans!' she mentally argued with herself. 'Get back to work or what you call your life.'
"Ouch, that hurt," she muttered at the harsh blows her subconscious shot at her. "That was a low blow, but you do have a point."
She flipped open the book and started leafing through it.
"Donn, Donn, Donn," she muttered as she searched. "Found it!"
She peered at the text and read.
Donn, the Celtic God of the Dead. Once from Knockfierna, he was a Faery king of Cnoc-Firinn, Co. Limerick. He was benign and vengeful, creator of storms and shipwrecks, and protector of cattle and crops.
When he first met Eriu, one of the Tuatha queens, a shapeshifting Goddess of Fate and a bestower of sovereignity, he did not show her the respect that she deserved. Due to that, she said that neither he nor his children would have benefit of the island.
So, while at sea he drowned off the southwest coast, and was buried on the island known as "The House of Donn".
And because he was the first of the faeries to die, he was deemed the God of the dead.
"So, he's buried at some island, doesn't that mean he's stuck to that place or something?" she asked no one in particular.
"No, he wasn't buried in Ireland," someone informed her.
"What do you want, Quesnel?" she sneered, turning her head to look him in the eye.
"To give you some useful information."
"Because I'm useless, right? All brawn and no brains? That it?"
"No, I didn't mean-"
"I don't care what you mean. Now, where's this info ya got for me?"
He sighed but spoke anyway. "Though Donn had died by the southwest coast of Ireland, he was not buried in the Emerald Isle itself for Eriu would hear nothing of it. He was buried in one of the neighboring isles. The one called 'The House of Donn'.
"The neighboring island happens to be part of Scotland and after a few centuries, the world had forgotten of this tale and deemed it a myth, nonsense. So, settlements have dwelled here, having no fear of Donn's wrath. Then it became a Wizarding establishment. One called Hogsmeade."
"Like I didn't see that coming," she muttered, voice dripping with sarcasm. "So, why does he decide to show his ugly face now? Why hasn't he been haunting this place for longer?"
"He has been terrorizing this town for more than a millennia. Their comings and goings have disturbed his fitful sleep, unleashing his wrath upon them. In the last few decades his fury has increasing, calling more minions. Especially the unholy ones."
"But if he's a pure demon or God of Death, why's he mingling with half-breeds? Don't he think they're unpure or something?" she asked; now interested.
"That I am not sure of. It is quite disconcerting. But he does have quite a following. All the vampires in Hogsmeade are under his power."
"Right, so I better get ready and interrogate the vamps before I kill them, right?"
"That's quite precise."
"So, the Society give you some weapons to give me? I'm running low on bolts and Holy Water."
"Yes, it is in the room I have rented."
"Let's go get 'em, then."
And with that, Slayer and Watcher left, staying as far away from each other as possible.
**************************************************************************************
A/N: So, how'd you guys like it? I decided to place some mushy stuff in it 'cause this is supposed to partly be a love story. And I'm sorry to all Mythology buffs if I kinda messed up the myth of Donn. It's kinda like that on the Buffy series, too. So sorry to all the people that are offended by this.