Chapter 2
The excitement of getting her very own magical supplies woke Lily up at 5 the morning that they were to go to Diagon Alley. At first, her brain still slow from sleep, Lily rolled over to go back to sleep since nobody in his or her right mind would get up that early during the summer. Of course, Lily was no longer in her right mind since she was now a witch, and she soon realized the exciting occasion this day held for her and sprang from her bed to get ready. An hour later, the groggy-eyed Evans family headed for the car, with a bright-eyed Lily behind them, egging them on.
"Come on! Let's go!" she cried. "You are so slow today! I want to get my supplies!
"Okay * yawn * Okay," Emily said, "Just let me finish my coffee."
Despite the complaining and the sleepiness and all that, they managed to get to Diagon Alley in an hour and a half. Lily practically dragged Petunia from the front seat where she had been napping, and hustled everyone into the Leaky Cauldron. She had to come back out to grab Emily since Emily was a muggle and couldn't see the quaint little pub.
They went around to the back where the entrance to Diagon Alley sat.
"Come on Petty! Open the entrance already!" Lily cried, not one for being patient.
"Hold on a minute, I'm trying to find my wand!" Petty replied as she rummaged through her bag. In truth, Petunia Evans did know where her wand was and didn't need to be searching her bag. It was tucked away in the hidden pocket located in her purse. Petunia was actually buying some time. All throughout the car-ride, Petunia had not actually been napping. She had really been contemplating a situation that her past mistakes had forced upon her. A task had been set for Petunia to see through, and if she didn't see it through, dire punishments would be served. Being the Slytherin that she was, Petunia soon decided that she didn't want the punishment and instead would do anything to get out of it. She discretely hid her wand in a fold of her shirt and pointed it at Lily. She whispered an incantation and watched Lily to see if the spell would take effect. Sure enough, a few seconds later, Lily briefly glowed bright green and a lightning shaped scar appeared on her forehead for a brief second. Almost immediately, everything was back to normal. Petunia stared at her sister, shocked.
"Petty, why are you staring at me like that?" Lily asked, noticing Petty's strange stare.
"Uh… er… I was just… just shocked at how excited that you are to be going to school. Yeah that's it… normally you would be moping around at home. And didn't you get up at 5 this morning? You never do that," stammered Petunia.
"It took you this long to notice? I woke you up way too early this morning didn't I? Petty's not an early bird is she? Ha ha ha!" Lily started laughing mockingly at Petunia, picking up the role of the annoying little sister.
"Yeah… uh… yeah that's totally it Lils," Petunia laughed nervously. That was too close. She decided to change the subject. "I've found my wand!"
"Yeah!" Lily cried. Emily sighed in relief. Soon her youngest will be too busy buying her school supplies, with Petunia no doubt, to give Emily any grief.
"Now Lily, you can…" Emily began only to be cut off by Petunia.
"Mom, I have to go meet up someone! I'll meet up with you later… say about 3 at the Leaky Cauldron? Bye!" Petunia immediately took off through the gateway to Diagon Alley, which she had quickly opened when she 'found' her wand.
Emily sighed with resignation to her fate of shopping with Lily. "Okay, lets go," she said with great effort. And off they went.
Meanwhile, Petunia had reached the entrance to a new alleyway. She looked around to make sure that nobody was watching and then ducked inside, bringing the hood up on her robe as she did so. She made a few quick turns and was at her meeting spot, and not too soon.
A dark hooded figure appeared in the alley behind her. Petunia quickly dropped to her knees, concentrating on not wincing from the pain that he caused her. How she hated that mark of captivity on her arm. The pain, the fright, the feeling that she can't do anything anymore without worrying about the mark were all driving her crazy. Where was the glory, the riches, the feeling of power, and the delight in torturing others that she had been promised? She looked at her scar, wondering not for the first time whether it was capable of reading minds. The sound of footsteps disrupted her thoughts and she glanced up to see another, smaller figure hustle into the clearing. The figure stopped in surprise before, face a mask of blankness, he too dropped to his knees.
"I see you two have decided to show, but we seem to be missing one," hissed the cold stranger. "Lucious?"
"Ah, yes, well… you see…" Lucious stammered. Petunia, noticing his lack of smoothness, glanced up in surprise. Could it be that Malfoy was also afraid of the power that Voldemort held over them?
"Spit it out!"
"I used Snape as a decoy for the marauders and he hasn't managed to escape yet," Lucious said in a rush.
"I see. I do hope that this unfortunate happening comes with some welcome news," the stranger, easily identified as Voldemort, said while gripping his wand in a threatening manner.
Lucious glance fell on the wand, and though his face remained blank, he took a slight step back in fear, causing Voldemort to grin evilly. "Yes, of course master. I, uh, I used the incantation on each of the Marauders in turn, and, well, its Potter sir."
"Ah, yes, I did so hope it was him. What a joy it is to actually have a cause to go after the Potter family," Voldemort hissed gleefully. "And for you, dearest mudblood, what have you got for me?"
Petunia winced inwardly. She knew it was only a matter of time before she had to relay the information about her sister to Voldemort. She realized that she was practically guaranteeing a usually short life for her sister, but it was better than a usually short life for herself, wasn't it? All the goodness and guiltiness was driving Petunia crazy. What happened to her Slytherin values, her loyalty to one of her own? Summer had had a strange effect on her, and she didn't like it one bit. Better to get this over with, than to risk feeling more pain. "Master, I performed to spell on all of those that were on the list, and it seems that Lily Evans is the one you were looking for."
"Very good mudblood; I knew you would come in handy. It's not very often a mudblood makes it into Slytherin you know," here Voldemort laughed, sending chills up both Malfoy and Petunia's spines. His laugh could scare any sane wizard; it was filled with the promise of torture, the screams of death and the coldness of one who was indifferent to it all. Snape choose this time to make his entrance. Once he was within sight and hearing, Snape slid down to his knees, awaiting the punishment that one gets from being late to a meeting. "Ah, Severus, so nice of you to finally join us, through being held us by some wimpy Gryffindors is a pitiful excuse to have, crucio." Voldemort pointed his wand at the prone figure and was rewarded not with the sound of screams for his Death Eaters were all trained to withhold their pain, but with the satisfactory thud of Snape hitting the ground and twitching uncontrollably.
Petunia and Malfoy looked on with indifference, both glad they weren't the victim, but both felt the tinge of guilt that witnessing evil each day had not entirely gotten rid of yet. Snape's torture soon came to an end and Voldemort decided that he should get on with business before anyone shows up in this alleyway.
"I hope you learned your lesson Snape, I should so hate to teach you again," Voldemort said, his tone implying otherwise.
"Yes Master," Snape muttered while concentrating on not wincing in pain as he picked himself off the ground.
"Good. Now, I want all of you to keep an eye on Potter and this Lily child. It is very important that I know of everything that goes on in their life. And I mean everything!" he barked at them. "Send information the usual way," he said, and disappeared after giving each of them a cool, calculating glare. He had to make sure he found out everything about these two people for they were the two that had the power to beat them if they worked together. He wanted to toy with them, confuse them, and install a fear in them that would cause them to falter in a duel with him. One mistake was all it took.
Petunia inwardly let out a sigh of relief as she saw her Master disappear. His glare had frightened her, it was as if he knew everything she did and Petunia did not like that feeling one bit. "Come on," she growled to the others. "Let's get out of here."
Lucius and Severus nodded and slowly got to their feet. They paused long enough for Severus to pull out a potions vial from his pocket and take a quick gulp, before heading on their way.
"Let's grab out stuff and get out of here," Snape muttered. He wasn't looking forward to staying here for long, not while the effects of the Crucias Curse were still flowing through his veins, even if the effects were slightly duller than they would have been because of his potion. The other two agreed and they silently went through their school list and bought everything they would need, and other things they thought useful of course.
At ten to three, the trio arranged where they were going to meet each other at the train station and split up. Throughout their whole time together, each avoided mentioning what went on at the meeting earlier.
Petunia headed for the Leaky Cauldron after leaving Snape and Malfoy. She did not look forward to looking her sister in the face after she gave up the information on her like that. For the rest of the summer, Petunia would learn to hate the guilty feeling that one glance of Lily gave her.
* * * * * * * * * * * *
"Come on, let's go!" Lily yelled. "We're going to be late!"
"Oh, so now that you are going to Hogwarts, it's suddenly important to get out the door on time. When I was the only one going to Hogwarts, you were never as anxious to get out on time so I wouldn't be late!" Petunia complained.
"And yet we still managed to get there on time, but now there are two of everything that we have to get on the train!" Lily replied. She grabbed her trunk and dragged it out to the car. "Mom! Come on! I can't lift this thing into the car all by myself!"
"I'm coming!" cried Emily. 2 more hours, and the house would be all hers. She just had to get through those 2 hours first. This doesn't imply that she doesn't love her children; on the contrary she loves them very much but it's always good to take a break from something, like raising children, which has taken over your life.
After a hectic 20 minutes in which the trunks were loaded and they had to turn around midway down the street because Petunia forgot her precious Slytherin scarf, the Evans family was finally on their way to the Hogwart's Express.
"Petty?" asked Lily as she squirmed slightly trying to get comfortable amidst books animal cages (they both had their own owls Lily's = a black owl named Snow and Petunia's = a white owl named Midnight). Since she was the youngest, Lily had to sit in the backseat if their car while Petunia sat in the front.
"Yes," answered Petunia, glancing back at her sister and wincing slightly at the sight of her innocent, trusting eyes. How could I have ever betrayed her?
"What's the sorting ceremony like?"
Petunia grinned evilly, forgetting about her guilt for a second. "Well it's different every year. My year merely had to make our wands spark, and the colors that came out determined your house. But last year, well they brought in this troll and each kid had to fight it. Depending on which strategy they used was what house they got into. I'm not too sure about the other years though, but I've heard stories."
Lily gulped visible scared. "N-nobody died did they?"
"Uh…I don't think so," Petunia said, pretending to think real hard. "I think one of the Hufflepuffs got seriously injured when he tried to cheer the troll up. He was one of the last ones to go and the troll was pretty mad by then."
"Oh," Lily squeaked. She wasn't so sure that she wanted to go to Hogwarts anymore; well she still wanted to go to Hogwarts, just maybe on the second day of school.
"Here we are girls," Emily called as she pulled up into the drop-off area at the station. "Petunia, take care of your sister. Lily, have fun dear. Both of you write often. Now get out!" Emily laughed, watching her children scramble out of the car. She watched as they dragged trolleys out to the car and helped each other put their trunks on them. She watched them walk into the crowd, heading for platform 9 ¾; and then the tears came.
Meanwhile, Lily and Petunia had finally made it to the barrier. "Okay Lily, you first." Lily took a deep breath and ran at the barrier, closing her eyes at the last second. When she opened them, she was looking at a magnificent station, though the effect was ruined as it was crowded and she couldn't get a good look at the station (She's short!). Across the platform, she could barely see a scarlet engine with the words 'Hogwarts Express' on the side in gold writing (Gryffindor anyone?). Minutes later, her sister joined her.
"Let's get you loaded up Lils so I can find Lucious and Sev."
Lily sighed. Here was the moment she was waiting for, had been waiting for the moment she got her acceptance letter to Hogwarts. Here was the time that her sister would ditch her in favor for her own friends. Oh well, it was bound to happen. Older sisters never seem to enjoy having the younger ones hang around them all the time anyway.
They lugged her trunk over to one of the empty compartments near the back and loaded it up. Petunia said a quick goodbye and set off, disappearing in the crowd. Lily quickly found a compartment that only had one other girl in it and settled in.
"Hello," the other girl said. She had short blonde hair and blue eyes and was as thin as thin could get. I mean this girl was a stick! All skin and bones!
"Hi," Lily replied softly. A few minutes passed in absolute silence. Finally, Lily gathered up her courage. She would have to make new friends anyway, why not start with this girl. "Are you a first year?"
"Yes, are you?" The other girl seemed relieved that Lily had broken the awful silence that had gathered.
"Yes." The silence came back.
The other girl broke it this time. "I heard two kids died last year in the sorting," she blurted out, obviously worried about the coming attraction.
"Really?" Lily exclaimed. "I heard that one got seriously injured but nobody died."
"How could that be? My brother specifically told me that two died. The enchanted toilet ate them."
"Enchanted toilet? My sister told me they had to fight a troll…."
The two girls looked at each other and immediately started laughing at their stupidity of believing their older siblings. "I'm Lily Evans," Lily said, sticking out her hand after she had regained control of her laughter.
"Arabella Murphy," the girl replied, shaking Lily's hand. Thus began a lasting friendship for it had been the first friendship each had made in their new school. They spent the rest of the train ride talking and goofing off and doing other stuff eleven year olds do.
A/N: Okay… This was a longer chapter and that's part of the reason why it took so long to get up. If y'all have any questions, please ask and if something is wrong with my writing or if you have suggestions to improve my story… please tell me! Thanks for reading this!