CHAPTER ONE.

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James Potter was having a bad dream. It was a surprisingly stormy night for so early in the Fall, and the thunder rumbled loudly just outside the window. James twitched restlessly, and mumbled groggy sounds into his pillow. A particularly loud thunderclap hit, followed by a spectacular jolt of lightning, and he shot up in bed, gasping loudly for breath.

"Alright, mate?" A young man with tousled black hair sat up sleepily in the bed nearest to James'. He rubbed the back of his neck and pushed away the locks of hair swinging over his deep brown eyes.

James swung his legs over the side of his four-poster and stared out the window.

"Yeah. G'back to sleep, Paddy." He attempted to smile convincingly at his half-sleeping friend.

Instead of laying back down, the boy rubbed his eyes and slid off of his bed. He sat down next to James and studied him for a moment, a sort of amused look dancing over his dark features.

"Bad dream, Prongs, old boy? Couldn't've been about… a certain GIRL, eh?" He grinned.

James snorted and opened his mouth to tell Sirius to go back to bed again, but the boy kept at it.

"Was she in mortal peril??" He put on an expression of feigned horror. "Did you fail in some noble quest to save her from a dreaded fate worse than death??"

"Look, Sirius, can't you just -- "

"Ooh, or did ickle Jamesie get turned down-- AGAIN?" Sirius wrinkled his nose and laughed.

James had to laugh, too. Sirius had such a strange manner about him -- he was irritatingly charming, and he had a way of making a person feel at ease. If anyone else had been teasing James like this, he likely would've clouted them. But Sirius…

A muffled groan came softly from the four-poster across from James'.

Sirius sat up very straight and looked at James with a solemn expression. James could see he was trying hard to keep from laughing again.

"Now you've done it." James said. He reached over to his night table to pick up his glasses. "You've awoken the sleeping beast." He adjusted the glasses over his hazel eyes and gave Sirius a wry smile.

Sirius' handsome face broke into a devilish grin as he got up and tip-toed quietly over to the other bed. He carefully pulled one of the pillows up from underneath the sleeping form, and he winked at James as he raised it over his head.

--WHAM--

The pillow came down upon the bed's occupant with such force that feathers burst out from the seams and rained down upon the boys.

Remus Lupin yelped loudly and jumped up, knocking his head on one of the wood posts of the bed. Sirius could no longer contain his malicious glee; he threw back his head and burst into loud howls of laughter.

"For Godsakes, Sirius!" James acted as though he was very upset and donned a very high-pitched voice. "Must you wake the whole school??"

Sirius paused for a moment and pretended to consider this.

"You're right, Potter. Hate to have Gilbert-the-Git wake up." He kept a straight face for a split second and then dissolved into laughter again.

James laughed, too. Gilbert Alfred Schlecter the Thirteenth was a Griffindor prefect, but a bossy prat. He was constantly badgering James and his friends about their mischief-making, and nagging them about losing House points.

A new voice suddenly spoke up: a very sleepy voice that could barely be understood for all the yawning.

"Wh -- whut're you doing, Sirius? Whus'so fu-- fu-- funny?"

A very mousy-looking boy with thick, dirty blond hair sat up in his four-poster next to Remus'. He had a round, pleasant face, and he smiled very sleepily as he tried to cover another enormous yawn with a pale hand. To his left, the boy called Remus was still rubbing his sore head.

"Ah, Petey! Smashing of you to join us! And I say, what good timing you have! I was just about to suggest that Moony here go ahead and wake you. If one of us can't sleep, well, the others jolly well shouldn't either!" Sirius put on his most charming face.

The boy rubbing his head looked up at Sirius. His hair was a very light shade of brown, and it curled slightly at the ends as it fell across his face, swaying freely in front of his brilliant, amber-colored eyes. He scowled slightly, and asked, "What's wrong THIS time, Padfoot? Shall I fetch you a chew toy? Perhaps have James scratch your tummy until you can sleep again?" At this last comment, the corners of his mouth began to turn up.

Sirius turned and looked at Remus.

"Whatever are you going on about, Moony? It's James here that can't sleep." He turned up his nose and smiled very smugly.

James felt himself go very pink as the three other boys turned and looked at him.

"Oh, come off it, Sirius. It was just that bloody storm; the thunder woke me, y'know?" He stared out the window again.

"He was having a bad dream about Evans." Sirius stated matter-of-factly as he lowered himself onto the edge of Remus' mattress.

The blond boy climbed down off his bed and sat down next to Sirius.

"Oh REALLY?" He asked, smiling slyly at the back of James' head.

Remus sat up as well. He looked from James to Peter, then to Sirius. Even in the dark, the gleam in Sirius' eyes was unmistakable.

"Come now, Prongs, you can tell us! We are, after all, your best mates!"

James turned slightly, his mouth half-open as though he was about to say something, but then thought better of it. He reached up and ruffled his jet-black hair.

"Nah, go back to bed." He looked back at them. "I mean it-- the lot of you!"

Sirius' grin only broadened.

"I'm hurt that you won't even trust your own friends, James! Really, I thought we meant more to you than that."

"That's right!" Peter chirped after him. "And as our fellow Marauder, it's your duty to be completely honest with us."

James looked pleadingly at Remus. He was always the most level-headed of the group; surely he could see that James wasn't in the mood for playing around?

Remus laughed and shook his head.

"Sorry, mate. Now I'm curious, too."

James sighed and fiddled idly with a string dangling from his pajama sleeve.

"It wasn't anything. It was just a dream."

"Yes, yes, we've been over this part already," Sirius said impatiently. "What were you dreaming about? It was obviously something important enough to wake you from a VERY deep sleep, Prongs; I know because I could hear you snoring before." He grinned very cheekily.

"I don't sn--" James began indignantly.

"Only kidding, Mr. Potter. Please continue."

James looked back at his three best friends, all of whom were staring intently at him. He ran his hand through his hair again.

"It was stupid, really. One of those random, jumbled dreams, y'know? I guess it was all those butterbeers we snuck back, eh, Sirius?" He paused and smiled at the other boy.

"Well anyway, it was about Lily, I guess. I can't remember how it all started. I just remember being in somebody's house with a load of other people; a party, I think. Professor Dumbledore was there, and my parents, and come to think of it, Sirius, your mum, she was there, too."

"My mum? You're joking; she wouldn't be caught dead anywhere with any..." Sirius assumed a very shrill female voice, "...FILTHY MUGGLE-LOVING BLOOD-TRAITORS!" He laughed sourly.

"Yeah, weird, I know." James went on. "Anyway, we were all there, and then Lily, she suddenly appears out of nowhere and runs up to me. And she's upset, y'know? Frantic-like." James made motions in the air with his hands.

"She kept trying to tell me something: something really important, I think. But she couldn't get any words out. And the harder she tried to speak, the more it seemed... it..." his voice started to trail off. "...it seemed to hurt her."

The three boys on the other bed were far too shocked at their friend's complete openness to tease him about getting soft over a girl. James cleared his throat and continued.

"There was a load of green light, all over everything. And I tried to tell her to run... I kept shouting at her, 'Lily, you've got to get out of here!' And she couldn't. She couldn't move and she couldn't talk... and I couldn't do a bloody thing but stand there and shout at her." He put a hand to his head and glanced over at his friends.

"That isn't the worst of it though. It was so dark, and she was so afraid -- I was so afraid--" he gulped. "And I kept shouting, and then everyone else started up. Everybody was shouting at her, and something about it just made me so angry, I… I raised my hand to hit her."

Remus drew in a sharp breath. Sirius let out a low whistle. Peter just stared, open-mouthed.

James looked up guiltily.

"I know, I can't explain it. It was a dream, and I couldn't do anything about it."

"So, you did, then?" Remus asked cautiously. "You... hit her?"

"No! No, of course not!" James exclaimed. "Well... at least, I don't think I did... that was when I woke up."

He looked pleadingly to his friends.

"But I wouldn't hit her in real life, ever; I'm not like that! You know that, don't you?"

Sirius spoke up quickly.

"Of course, Prongs. It was just a dream, after all." His tone was different somehow, and he glanced at Remus for a fleeting instant.

Remus stared at his feet numbly. He had a horrible, sick feeling in his gut, and for some reason, he just didn't feel like talking anymore. Sirius, seeing this, tried to lighten the mood.

"Yes, well, I think this dream of yours can only mean one thing." He wore another very solemn expression.

"What?" Asked James hurriedly. "What do you think it means?"

Sirius drew in a very deep breath, as though what he was about to say held the weight of the world in its context.

"It means you're nutters, mate." He kept a poker face and nodded firmly at James.

There were a few seconds of utter silence before they burst into laughter.

James removed his glasses and rubbed his eyes as his laughter subsided.

"Well I'm very glad I can count on my friends for reassurance."

"Oh, come on, James; it's like Sirius said. It was just a dream." Peter sighed. "It isn't as though you've automatically morphed into some ruddy sadist who runs about beating his women."

Sirius snickered. "Or maybe the problem is that she isn't his woman?"

James shot him a dirty look.

Finally Remus spoke up.

"Look," he pointed to the clock on James' nightstand, "It's four o'clock in the morning. And we have double Potions first thing today. I'm going back to sleep."

He started to stand up, and then realized that he was already on his bed. And that Sirius and Peter were on it, too.

"Geroff, you two!" Remus swatted at them with his pillow. Then he looked up at James and grinned.

"I can't believe you woke us all up just to hear about a stupid dream."

"I woke you up??!!" James picked up his own pillow, laughing, and held it up as if to clout him with it.

"Now James, you must learn to take responsibility for your own actions. Cause and effect, you know." Sirius stood up and patted him patronizingly.

"Ah, too right you are, Sirius." James replied politely. "I wonder, please, if could you tell me what effect this will bring about?"

And with that he swung his pillow as hard as he could at Sirius, and the mayhem began.

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It was not until over an hour later, as the boys lay completely exhausted, sprawled across Remus' bed, that the dormitory was even remotely quiet again.

Sirius groaned and blew his long hair out of his eyes.

"I dunno, Moony, I think that last hit of yours broke my jaw."

Remus raised an eyebrow.

"It was a pillow, Padfoot. Y'know, those fluffy things filled with feathers?" He grinned.

"Not anymore, they're not." Peter motioned to the floor.

James peered over the end of the bed and laughed. It was as though Winter had come early to Griffindor Tower. Every last inch of the floor in their circular dormitory was covered in a thick blanket of tiny, white feathers.

"Brilliant, mates! It's just like Christmas!" He rolled over onto his stomach and closed his eyes.

"Well, it isn't my turn to clean it up. I had to take care of all those Dungbombs yesterday, and as you'll all kindly remember, the teachers don't allow the use of magic during detention."

Sirius yawned.

"S'not my turn, either. I cleaned up that nasty spill in the Potions storeroom last week, and that lot smelled worse than ol' Snivellus, it did."

"Oh, shut up, Sirius. You had to clean it up because you were the one that knocked the cupboard over in the first place." James said sleepily. "Just forget it; I'll clean it up..." his breathing began to slow, "...clean it up... first thing... tomorrow...."

But there was no reply from Sirius, or indeed, from any of the boys. They were all fast asleep.