-Chapter 4-

-Detention and Defying Death-

(A/N: Since I've had someone get confused, this is a few weeks into Hogwarts.)

Professor McGonagall fumed at the two people in front of her, a pretty young lady with auburn hair and striking green eyes, and a tall, gangly, young man, with dark hair and even darker eyes. Both were dressed in her house colors, scarlet and gold, the colors of Gryffindor house.

"Do you two have a vendetta against me?" she purred.

They mumbled a negative reply, both sets of eyes downcast.

"Lily, I am most seriously disappointed in you. You may understand all the basics, but transfiguration is not an easy thing. Many of your fellow students still have not mastered it."

"Yes ma'am," Lily muttered.

"And you," The professor turned on the boy, "James, there is no reason for you to talk to a lady that way-"

"But she's not a lady!" James exclaimed.

"Yes I am!" Lily bit back, turning to confront him.

"No you're not."

"Yes I am."

BANG!

Both stopped bickering, and turned slowly to face the professor. She was now so mad her mouth was pressed into a thin white line.

"Ten points from Gryffindor!"

"What?"

"How can you take points from your own house!?"

"As easily as giving you two detention, James." Lily's face went as white as a ghost, while James's remained unaffected, he had already received two detentions so far this year.

"De-detention?" Lily stammered.

"Yes Miss Evans. Detention."

"But Professor McGonagall," pleaded Lily. "I've never had a detention before."

James rolled his eyes.

"Mr. Potter, I suggest you keep your eyes straight forward at all times."

After a moments thought she said, "Come to my office after dinner to schedule your detention. I think giving the Trophy room a once over polish with your two wrists tied together is fair." Lily's shock was indescribable.

"You are dismissed."

Outside the door James knew Miss Perfect Evans would start crying. He was very, very wrong.

"You."

James turned around to see Lily, not shaking with tears, but rage. Her emerald eyes glowing likes twin miniature green fires.

"I had the perfect record. Do you realize what you just did, Potter?" Lily spat.

"No."

"Wrong answer."

"I'm sorry," James backed away, seeing Lily go for her wand, "I'm sorry, but what is one detention going to do?"

"What will it do, Potter? What will it do!"

Then she turned on her heel and left. Lily made a beeline for Gryffindor Tower, tears stinging her eyes.

"Password?"

"Frilly underthings," she choked.

"My, my. Poor dearie." Cooed the fat lady, as she swung open to reveal the Gryffindor common room.

Lily dove into a chair near the fire and wept. Wept for her record, now broken. Wept for her reputation, now shattered. Finally she wept for her goal, to be Head Girl, which now seemed unattainable, with this small but substantial blemish.

A Detention.

"Lily?" Lily lifted her swollen and puffy eyes to reveal Maggie.

"Oh, Maggie. I've got a detention."

Maggie understood her friend's goals and dreams.

"No!"

Lily nodded and burst into tears again; Maggie knelt down and stroked her head, telling her it wasn't the end of the world.

Margaret Amberson had met Lily Evans on the Hogwarts Express, two scared little girls, both who had grown up in Muggle homes, being thrown into worlds of amazing and impossible things. Maggie calmed Lily, just enough to hear she had even been the cause of a deduction of ten points from Gryffindor.

Lily had almost told the cause of her detention when the portrait hole swung open. Lily glared at the opening; Maggie guessed whoever was coming in was the source of the detention.

Maggie turned to reveal James Potter and his friend Sirius Black entering the room. Maggie turned back to her friend who was now trying to blow a hole through the floor with her vision.

"Lily! Quit staring so hard! You'll give yourself a headache!" Maggie joked.

"He is such a know-it-all!"

"I know."

"All he cares about is Quidditch."

"I know."

"I don't think I'll ever talk to him again."

"Ok, Lily, that's a little much."

"No, it's not."

"Yeah, it is."

"No."

"Ok, fine, all the better for me."

That stopped Lily's ranting.

"What?"

"I mean that is one less girl to like him. So, maybe, I'll have a better chance with him."

"You're talking about him like he's a good thing."

"Lily. Come on. Potter's not so bad. I don't think so. And you know you don't really hate him."

"Your right. I don't care a whit about him."

"That's right!" Maggie egged her on; 'Maybe she'll stop talking about him!'

"In fact," Lily continued, perked up by the encouragement, " I'm going to go mail the letter I wrote for my family right now."

Lily stood up, went and got her letter from her trunk, and set out for the Owlery. Before she left the common room she had wanted to show Potter she was strong and could take Professor McGonagall's punishment, but he had disappeared.

No matter, she thought to herself as she maneuvered through the other students on their way to classes. Lily was always amazed at the sheer amount of birds that flew around in the Owlery. It was probably her favorite place in the castle, not mentioning the windowsill in her dormitory. Lily scanned the masses of feathers for the ones she knew belonged to her owl.

When she heard a familiar ruffle of wings behind her, she spun, and found her owl. Her black feathers sharply contrasted her large, pale green eyes. She had named her owl, Mint. Her mother had given it to her when they had arrived at Platform 9 ¾, the owl had finally found them while they were nearing King's Cross. Her heart ached as she thought of her parents and sister.

"Hello, Mint. I have a letter for home."

Lily tied a red ribbon to her owl's leg with the note attached, and Mint took off. Lily followed her to the window. She leaned against the sill until she could no longer see her precious bird. The something else caught her eye. A single figure, flying around the Quidditch field. Lily sighed in disgust. She knew who that lone figure would be.

Potter.

She was about to turn away from the all too usual spectacle when she noticed another figure join him on the field, and another, and another.

Now four small specks were flying around, and they didn't look like they were being nice either. It looked almost like a deadly game of tag. Being slightly nosy, Lily decided to investigate.

What she found was not at all surprising.

Potter was on his broomstick, and so was his friend Sirius, he is definitely not as graceful as Potter in the air, she observed. The other two people were no surprise either, Lucius Malfoy, and his friend, the slimy Severus Snape. Severus was the first one to notice Lily.

"Lucius." Said Severus, and he made a slight downward motion with his head.

Lucius caught it and looked down, there was one of those Gryffindor girls, the really pretty one. Then he got an idea. Surely Potter liked her; otherwise he wouldn't have fought with her so loudly last year after the O.W.L.s. He grinned slyly and just as Potter got the notion there might be something way down there on the ground, Lucius dove at Lily.

There was nothing anyone could do to stop the sixty-mile an hour broomstick hurtling towards Lily.

She dove out of the way, landing roughly on the ground. The air above her rushed past, he had barely missed.

Lily quickly rolled over and was on her feet, she whipped out her wand. Before she could say or do anything Lucius had turned around and was heading back at her. Lily thought she heard yells, but she couldn't tell her mind was so blurred. When he hit her, it knocked the wind from her. Before Lily had time to draw a breath she was hundreds of feet above the ground. Lucius had picked her up, and was holding her hostage at the far end of the Quidditch field, as far from the ground as from the other boys.

She twisted her body to see Lucius' face, he was grinning. It was a twisted, evil grin.

James knew what Lucius would do in an instant. He dove forward as fast as his prized Black Flash would take him. Then Lucius did it.

He dropped Lily.

James sped up, thinking of Lily as the Golden Snitch, but this Golden Snitch would die if he didn't reach it in time. The wind rushed in his ears, but he pressed harder. Down, down she fell. James didn't know if he could make it in time. Twenty feet above the ground, he caught her.

It was almost like she had fainted, or died falling she was so limp in his arms. Slowly she came to, but he wouldn't set her down until she was awake and could stand, even run away from here. Her eyes opened and stared up at his, and as he set down his broom, his eyes locked with hers. He set her on the ground.

"Get away from here. Go find a professor."

He could tell his instructions were falling on deaf ears. So, James shot back up into the sky where Lucius had rejoined the little group. He and Severus sneered at James.

"Too bad, Potter," came Lucius' cold voice. "All that energy wasted. Ha. She is only a Mudblood."

Lily saw the change in mood, James lunged at Lucius throwing punches, and Sirius and Severus joined in on the act, when it stopped.

Just stopped.

They were frozen in time, arms poised to fight, when Lily had the sensation that someone was behind her. She turned to face Albus Dumbledore.

"Miss Evans," he said with his calm voice. "Do you mind standing next to me as we listen to the boys' stories?"

"N-not at all."

Lily moved to stand behind Dumbledore as he pointed his wand at Severus Snape. Severus came to life and slowly made his way down to stand in front of Dumbledore.

"Mr. Snape, what happened?"

"We had a dispute over a game, sir." It made Lily sick that Severus could lie that easily.

"Thank you, Severus, you may return now." Severus Snape turned sneered at Lily. She secretly wished she had never interfered in Potter and Black's unfair torture of him last year. Severus slunk off in the direction of Hogwarts. Lily asked Dumbledore how much of the dispute he had seen.

His solemn reply was, "All."

Next Dumbledore released Sirius Black.

"Mr. Black, what happened?" Sirius started his story from where Lily had been observing from the Owlery window, he came out to fly with James and then Malfoy and Snape joined in the fun, taunting and trying to knock them off their brooms. Lucius picked up and dropped Lily, James saved her and then- Sirius cut short and his cheeks and ears turned a bright red.

"Mr. Black? Then what happened?"

"Lucius called Evans a-"

Dumbledore, calm and composed pressed, "A what?"

"A Mudblood." Black spat out the words, they obviously tasted horrible to him.

This obviously upset Dumbledore, "You may go now."

Next he released Lucius Malfoy. He made up a story about how James and Sirius had challenged he and Severus to a game, a deadly one. Then Potter started to beat them up because they wouldn't play. No mention of Lily or name- calling.

"You may go now."

Finally Dumbledore called down James Potter.

"Mr. Potter, what happened?"

His story matched word for word with what Sirius reported. James stopped at the time of name-calling and turned red also.

"What James?" pressed Dumbledore.

"I'd rather not repeat what Malfoy called the lady."

'The Lady? Weren't we just fighting over that?' Lily wondered.

"It's all right. Mr. Black told me. Also, I saw the entire thing. Start to finish."

James caught Lily's eye, "I'm sorry."

"Me too." She replied.

"Well, that was easy, wasn't it?" said Dumbledore grinning. "See? Had you done that earlier this whole detention mess could have been avoided."

"But," he quickly added, seeing Lily's eyes brim with tears, "maybe that detention isn't necessary. Am I right?"

Lily's eyes now overflowed with tears as she ran forward and embraced Albus Dumbledore. Dumbledore went pink and returned the hug, he understood. James did too. Her dream of being Head Girl was as important to him as his winning the House Cup for Gryffindor. He wished he could tell her how much SHE meant to him.

"How about we return to Hogwarts?" he proposed.

"Yes." said the girl.

"Yes." said the boy.

~-~-~-~-~-~

Lucius' punishment came within a week of the incident. He was to be sent home. Not expelled, just given a few weeks away from Hogwarts to think over his error.

"That's outrageous!" shouted James one morning at breakfast. His fist pounded the table so hard it startled Peter Pettigrew.

"James," Peter mumbled, "It is entirely Professor Dumbledore's decision. You've repeated over a hundred times that he saw the whole thing."

"Yes, but Peter, you weren't there. Dumbledore should have at the very least expelled him!" Commented Sirius.

"Oh well," Remus Lupin pushed out through his full mouth. "You win some you lose some. James, it's my opinion that you DEFINETLY won this one." Remus added a sly nod of his head at a cluster of girls whispering and enjoying their breakfast. James went a little pink at that inclination. He went even redder when the girls started to giggle. Sirius laughed at James, "Aw, come on! You know you like the attention those fourth year girls are giving you!"

"Pack it in." James said in a low voice. They returned to eating and making fun of James. Suddenly the Great Hall went silent.

Dead silent.

The boys looked around to see what had made the change in mood. Lucius Malfoy stood in the entryway, glaring at James and Sirius. The boys simply stared blankly back at him. Lucius gave a silent nod to Severus. Then he swung around and stomped loudly out the door and down the hallway. Every single eye was then turned towards James and Sirius.

James knew he had to do something, so he said in a pleasant tone, "Well, I'm glad he told us 'Good-Bye' before he left, otherwise I would feel very offended."

"Quite right, my man. Quite right." Sirius agreed.

After a short burst of nervous laughter, the Great Hall was back to normal, as placid as the magical early September sky covering the room's ceiling.

(End Chapter 4)

(For my dad who saw the principles behind the magic.)