~*~GREEN EYES~*~
Chapter Forty- Going Home for the Holidays
"Lily, what on earth are you doing?" asked Jamie as she walked into the Gryiffindor common room. Lily had all of her school work spread across an entire table and she was intently writing an essay for history of magic.
"Just doing some homework," Lily replied. Jamie sighed.
"Lily, you need to have some fun. Look, it just stopped snowing. Let's go out on the grounds, it's beautiful out there," said Jamie. Lily looked out of the window and saw that the grounds had been transformed into a wonderland of snow.
"Okay fine, I've been cooped up in here forever anyway. And it is the last day before the holidays, right?" said Lily, justifying her choice to go outside more to herself than to Jamie. Jamie smiled.
"Well what are you waiting for?" she asked, and before Lily could respond she pulled her up by the arm and let her out to the portrait hole. Jamie was right, it was very beautiful out there. Snow clung to the trees on the grounds, making even the whomping willow look completly serene, and the light was just soft enough to add a rich golden color to the snow without making a brillinat white. Lily was taking this all in when she felt a soft snowball hit her in the shoulder.
"Sirius Black you are in for it!" she yelled as she turned to see Sirius grinning at her. He quickly tired to hid his happiness and pointed over to James.
"It was him!" he exclaimed before running away in the opposite direction. Lily picked up a handful of the soft snow and threw it at Sirius. It hit him square on the behind and Lily let out a laugh.
"Hey, that's just not cool," said Sirius, who had started throwing snowballs back at Lily. Lily dodged a few of them, and was just preparing to hit Sirius when something hit her right in the face. Lily looked over to see a snikering James. Jamie threw a snowball at James, and Remus threw one back at Jamie. Soon they were in an all out, boys against girls war.
Lily had taken it upon herself to become the general in command. She quickly scouted out a place to use as a fort and got Jamie on the job of building it as she fought back with snowballs. She then spotted two Ravenclaws, who she put in charge of the attack while she ran up to the castle to go get some new recruits. She spotted Lauren the second she walked into the great hall.
"Lauren, big snowball fight outside! Round up as many girls as you can and get them down to the grounds!" Lily yelled, then she sprinted back outside and started attacking the boys with snowballs again while making her way to the fort. When she got there she saw a small igloo.
"How do you like the fort?" asked Jamie. Lily just huffed.
"You call that a fort? I can't believe I trusted you to something this important!" exclaimed Lily. She then took out her wand, muttered a charm, and in seconds the fort had been trasfigured into a huge glass fortress- three stories of ice with numerous rooms and a drawbridge. Lily looked at it and smiled. "Now that's better! Now what are you all staring at fight, fight, FIGHT I TELL YOU FIGHT!"
***
Meanwhile, the boys were also working on stragety. It was in the middle of James' complicated plan to storm the girls with some sort of artilarary that Remus noticed a fort looming in the distance.
"Hey James, don't want to burst your bubble but we have bigger problems," Remus stated, pointing over at the girl's fort. James pulled out a pair of binoculors and looked at it.
"That little cheat! I can't believe that she is using magic, this is so unfair. Well I'll just give her a taste of her own medicine, I'm better at transfiguration than she is anyway," said James. He took out his wand and made an ice castle out of a few spare snowballs. He then grinned an evil grin and looked over at Sirius and Remus.
"I think it's great," said Remus.
"Yeah, yeah so do I. I think it's the greatest!" exclaimed a small, squeaky voice from behind him. James turned around to find himself face to face with the one and only Gilderoy Lockhart.
"Roy? What are you doing here?" asked Sirius. Gilderoy looked a little dejected for a moment and then replied.
"Well it's all over the school that there is a huge snowball war going on out here. I just wanted to come and see it," said Roy. James was about to tell Roy to leave when Roy said. "I know that you probably think that I won't be an asset, but I really do know how to get in a girl's head, what with being such a ladies man and all."
"More like he is one with all the time he spends on his hair," Sirius whispered to Remus. James, however, thought that Roy had a point.
"So what do you propose we do, if you're such an expert?" asked James. Roy stroked an imaginary goatee.
"Hum...good question. Well, girls don't like things that smell bad. Why don't you send them some skunk smell or something, force them out of that fortress," said Roy.
"Excellent..." said James in an evil voice. He took out his wand and soon the girls were bombarded with a grotesque scent.
"What the heck is that?" asked Lily, still throwing snowballs at the boys.
"Ugh, it smells like skunk!" exclaimed a Ravenclaw.
"Lily, what should we do?" asked a hufflepuff first year. Lily thought for a moment.
"Well first we have to get that horrible stench to go away..." said Lily, taking out her wand. The air suddenly smelled of vanilla. "That's better. Now everyone, take out their visibility! Shoot colored mist at them! That should keep them out of our hair for awhile."
The battle continued for nearly an hour after that, until one of the boys surrendered. As soon as it was over, Lily went outside to gloat to James.
"Looks like I win," she said, her teeth chattering. Apparently she had just noticed how cold she was.
"Looks like you're all wet," replied James. He took off his cloak and wrapped it around her shoulders.
"Thanks," she said.
"Hey, you did a good job," said James.
"I guess you didn't do that badly either," replied Lily with a laugh.
"And it's time for dinner," said James. Lily looked over at him and smiled.
"That's all you have on your mind, isn't it? Food, that's what you care about," she said.
"That's not true. Anyway, I have a better idea," said James.
"And what idea is that?" asked Lily.
"Just follow me," said James. They went in the entrance to the school and then turned left, towards a painting of Hogsmeade. James ran his fingers along the side and the portrait opened up, allowing James to step through.
"Come on, give me your hand," said James, holding his hand out to Lily. Lily smiled and let James help her up into the tunnel. They walked along for about fifteen minutes, talking happily about everything that had been going on lately. About halfway into their walk James remebered a charm that would dry Lily's clothes, but she was still quite freezing. Finally they stepped out of the tunnel into an alley. Lily had already guessed that James was taking her to Hogsmeade, and she was more than happy when James lead her into The Three Broomsticks and sat her down at one of the small tables. Lily sat there while James went to get the drinks. He returned with two butterbeers, which completly warmed Lily up with the first sip.
"Thanks for taking me here. This is one of the best ideas that you've had," said Lily. James smiled.
"Hey, it's Christmas time. I generally get good ideas by then," said James. "Speaking of which, what did you get me for Christmas?" Lily leaned her head forwards towards James'.
"That's for me to know and you to find out. Unless you tell me what you got me," said Lily. James leaned his head in until their foreheads were touching and then broke into a huge grin.
"That's for me to know and you to find out!" he said. He took a couple seconds to look into Lily's bright green eyes and then moved back to his usual posture. Lily smiled, things were finally back to normal again.
***
The Hogwarts express left the castle at 10 in the morning. In the compartment that Lily, James, Sirius, Remus, Jamie, Lauren and Peter were sharing there was quite a comotion, a sharp contrast to the serene scene outside. It had started to snow again, the snowfalkes came down silently outside. They were about three fourths of the way home when the lady who pushed the cart down the asile offered them all hot chocolate. They, of course, agreed to buy some and sat there, sipping silently. Finally Sirius decided to talk.
"So what do you guys think about the whole dark arts situation?" he asked.
"I'm scared. I'm scared for my parents, they're muggles you know. And most of the attacks have been on muggles who are parents of wizards, or sisters or cousins..." said Lily, trailing off.
"Well it wouldn't matter if something happened to that sister of yours," said Sirius jokingly, causing Lily to laugh. "But honestly, I think they will be okay. I mean you know when you have one of those feelings that nothing bad is going to happen? That's what I feel now. Your parents will be fine." Sirius was not as sure as he sounded, but he succeded in cheering Lily up a little bit.
"Yeah..." she stated quietly.
"I just wonder when all of this is going to be over. I mean, things like this never happen. Most wizards don't just go around looking for followers and trying to take over the world. And the ones that do try...well the ministry gets to them real fast," said Lauren. Jamie nodded.
"It's scary that he has stood up to the minstry for this long. I mean, there was a witch that tried to gain power when we were first years and she only lasted about a week," said Jamie.
"Well when you think about it, it hasn't been that long," said James. "I mean, since this summer. It hasn't even been a year. They'll catch him, I'm sure of it," said James. Sirius must have realized that he had brought up a bad topic, because he quickly changed the subject.
"So, how about them cannons, eh?" he asked, and the group talked about quidditch until it was time to get off the train.
James' mother and father were waiting at the gate for James and Lily, his father talking to some ministry officials and his mother gossiping as usual. However, a very unusual thing happened when James started to leave Platform 9 and 3/4 through the barrier.
"James darling, where on earth do you think you're going?" asked Mrs. Potter, crossing her arms.
"Home..." said James, as if this were obvious.
"Well the grate is that way, we need to go there if we are going to leave by floo powder," stated Mr. Potter. James gave them a suprised look.
"What do you mean, we're actually leaving by floo powder?" asked James. Since James had been a first year, his father had never allowed him to go anyway but friends' houses by floo powder. He said that only ordinary people arrived in that manner, and they were far from ordinary.
"Well yes we are leaving by floo powder! How else would we go?" asked Mrs. Potter. James rolled his eyes and followed her. He had wanted to say By car, like we've done every other year, but luckily for him he was able to hold his tounge.
"Here you go James, Lily," said Mr. Potter, handing scarlet crystals to Lily and James. They both looked at them with awe, they had used floo powder on many ocassions and it most definatly did not look like scarlet crystals.
"Um, Mr. Potter, what exactly is this?" asked Lily.
"It's a new type of floo powder, extra security. I throw it in and one of the house elves will see us in the fire. Then they haveto ask a password to verify that we are allowed to go in, check a list and then they press a button to let us in. It's top security. Lily, I've made sure that they know you are on the list. James, you may go first and then it is your turn Lily," explained Mr. Potter. James hurried to the fire and threw in the red crystals. The entire grate was suddenly a blurred shadow.
"It's for security reasons Lily. Makes sure that no one else can hear the password," said Mrs. Potter as the grate came back in to vision with James gone. "It's frog legs by the way," Mrs. Potter added in a whisper. Lily stepped forward and threw the crystals into the fire. The fire blazed silver, and a house elf came into view.
"Name?" said the elf in her high, squeaky voice.
"Lily Evans," replied Lily.
"Password?" the elf inquired.
"Frog legs," said Lily. The fire then turned green and Lily stepped through. The spinning sensation was not as terrible as it usually was with floo powder, and Lily landed neatly on an area rug in James' living room with not a spot of soot on her. James smiled at her, and handed her trunk to a house elf that was waiting patiently to take it.
"The new floo powder's really something, isn't it?" asked James.
"Yeah, it's great," replied Lily. She had just noticed the amazing Christmas decorations that the Potters had put up. They were more elaborate than the Hogwarts decorations; holly and mistletoe were strung everywhere. In the corner there was a large Chritmas tree that must have been thirty feet tall, decorated with floating fairy lights. There was a sea of presents under it, and Lily couldn't help gazing at the splendidly decorated room.
"Lily, don't you want to go to your room now?" asked James. Lily nodded, and they made there way up a flight of sprial stairs, through a hallway, down a flight of stairs and then up three more flights
The room that Lily was to be staying in reminded her of the princess' castles in the disney movies. There were long, purple curtains that hung down to the ground, tapestries, a balcony, a queen sized bed complete with a comfortable looking purple comforter and a canopy. James left Lily to unpack her things, a task which she completed in less than ten minutes. From her bed she looked out of the window and saw the snow falling on the beautiful garden in the backyard, and Lily couldn't help but think that this was the place where she was meant to be.
A/N- Well isn't it purdy? I think so. The next chapter is going to be a really long one (James' party, christmas, and new years all squished into one super chapter) and that should bring us pretty much to a few short chapters and (dun dun dun!) Valentine's Day. So stayed tuned, and until then please review.
Disclaimer- It was J.K.R.'s idea! She started it! *pouts like a child*
Chapter Forty- Going Home for the Holidays
"Lily, what on earth are you doing?" asked Jamie as she walked into the Gryiffindor common room. Lily had all of her school work spread across an entire table and she was intently writing an essay for history of magic.
"Just doing some homework," Lily replied. Jamie sighed.
"Lily, you need to have some fun. Look, it just stopped snowing. Let's go out on the grounds, it's beautiful out there," said Jamie. Lily looked out of the window and saw that the grounds had been transformed into a wonderland of snow.
"Okay fine, I've been cooped up in here forever anyway. And it is the last day before the holidays, right?" said Lily, justifying her choice to go outside more to herself than to Jamie. Jamie smiled.
"Well what are you waiting for?" she asked, and before Lily could respond she pulled her up by the arm and let her out to the portrait hole. Jamie was right, it was very beautiful out there. Snow clung to the trees on the grounds, making even the whomping willow look completly serene, and the light was just soft enough to add a rich golden color to the snow without making a brillinat white. Lily was taking this all in when she felt a soft snowball hit her in the shoulder.
"Sirius Black you are in for it!" she yelled as she turned to see Sirius grinning at her. He quickly tired to hid his happiness and pointed over to James.
"It was him!" he exclaimed before running away in the opposite direction. Lily picked up a handful of the soft snow and threw it at Sirius. It hit him square on the behind and Lily let out a laugh.
"Hey, that's just not cool," said Sirius, who had started throwing snowballs back at Lily. Lily dodged a few of them, and was just preparing to hit Sirius when something hit her right in the face. Lily looked over to see a snikering James. Jamie threw a snowball at James, and Remus threw one back at Jamie. Soon they were in an all out, boys against girls war.
Lily had taken it upon herself to become the general in command. She quickly scouted out a place to use as a fort and got Jamie on the job of building it as she fought back with snowballs. She then spotted two Ravenclaws, who she put in charge of the attack while she ran up to the castle to go get some new recruits. She spotted Lauren the second she walked into the great hall.
"Lauren, big snowball fight outside! Round up as many girls as you can and get them down to the grounds!" Lily yelled, then she sprinted back outside and started attacking the boys with snowballs again while making her way to the fort. When she got there she saw a small igloo.
"How do you like the fort?" asked Jamie. Lily just huffed.
"You call that a fort? I can't believe I trusted you to something this important!" exclaimed Lily. She then took out her wand, muttered a charm, and in seconds the fort had been trasfigured into a huge glass fortress- three stories of ice with numerous rooms and a drawbridge. Lily looked at it and smiled. "Now that's better! Now what are you all staring at fight, fight, FIGHT I TELL YOU FIGHT!"
***
Meanwhile, the boys were also working on stragety. It was in the middle of James' complicated plan to storm the girls with some sort of artilarary that Remus noticed a fort looming in the distance.
"Hey James, don't want to burst your bubble but we have bigger problems," Remus stated, pointing over at the girl's fort. James pulled out a pair of binoculors and looked at it.
"That little cheat! I can't believe that she is using magic, this is so unfair. Well I'll just give her a taste of her own medicine, I'm better at transfiguration than she is anyway," said James. He took out his wand and made an ice castle out of a few spare snowballs. He then grinned an evil grin and looked over at Sirius and Remus.
"I think it's great," said Remus.
"Yeah, yeah so do I. I think it's the greatest!" exclaimed a small, squeaky voice from behind him. James turned around to find himself face to face with the one and only Gilderoy Lockhart.
"Roy? What are you doing here?" asked Sirius. Gilderoy looked a little dejected for a moment and then replied.
"Well it's all over the school that there is a huge snowball war going on out here. I just wanted to come and see it," said Roy. James was about to tell Roy to leave when Roy said. "I know that you probably think that I won't be an asset, but I really do know how to get in a girl's head, what with being such a ladies man and all."
"More like he is one with all the time he spends on his hair," Sirius whispered to Remus. James, however, thought that Roy had a point.
"So what do you propose we do, if you're such an expert?" asked James. Roy stroked an imaginary goatee.
"Hum...good question. Well, girls don't like things that smell bad. Why don't you send them some skunk smell or something, force them out of that fortress," said Roy.
"Excellent..." said James in an evil voice. He took out his wand and soon the girls were bombarded with a grotesque scent.
"What the heck is that?" asked Lily, still throwing snowballs at the boys.
"Ugh, it smells like skunk!" exclaimed a Ravenclaw.
"Lily, what should we do?" asked a hufflepuff first year. Lily thought for a moment.
"Well first we have to get that horrible stench to go away..." said Lily, taking out her wand. The air suddenly smelled of vanilla. "That's better. Now everyone, take out their visibility! Shoot colored mist at them! That should keep them out of our hair for awhile."
The battle continued for nearly an hour after that, until one of the boys surrendered. As soon as it was over, Lily went outside to gloat to James.
"Looks like I win," she said, her teeth chattering. Apparently she had just noticed how cold she was.
"Looks like you're all wet," replied James. He took off his cloak and wrapped it around her shoulders.
"Thanks," she said.
"Hey, you did a good job," said James.
"I guess you didn't do that badly either," replied Lily with a laugh.
"And it's time for dinner," said James. Lily looked over at him and smiled.
"That's all you have on your mind, isn't it? Food, that's what you care about," she said.
"That's not true. Anyway, I have a better idea," said James.
"And what idea is that?" asked Lily.
"Just follow me," said James. They went in the entrance to the school and then turned left, towards a painting of Hogsmeade. James ran his fingers along the side and the portrait opened up, allowing James to step through.
"Come on, give me your hand," said James, holding his hand out to Lily. Lily smiled and let James help her up into the tunnel. They walked along for about fifteen minutes, talking happily about everything that had been going on lately. About halfway into their walk James remebered a charm that would dry Lily's clothes, but she was still quite freezing. Finally they stepped out of the tunnel into an alley. Lily had already guessed that James was taking her to Hogsmeade, and she was more than happy when James lead her into The Three Broomsticks and sat her down at one of the small tables. Lily sat there while James went to get the drinks. He returned with two butterbeers, which completly warmed Lily up with the first sip.
"Thanks for taking me here. This is one of the best ideas that you've had," said Lily. James smiled.
"Hey, it's Christmas time. I generally get good ideas by then," said James. "Speaking of which, what did you get me for Christmas?" Lily leaned her head forwards towards James'.
"That's for me to know and you to find out. Unless you tell me what you got me," said Lily. James leaned his head in until their foreheads were touching and then broke into a huge grin.
"That's for me to know and you to find out!" he said. He took a couple seconds to look into Lily's bright green eyes and then moved back to his usual posture. Lily smiled, things were finally back to normal again.
***
The Hogwarts express left the castle at 10 in the morning. In the compartment that Lily, James, Sirius, Remus, Jamie, Lauren and Peter were sharing there was quite a comotion, a sharp contrast to the serene scene outside. It had started to snow again, the snowfalkes came down silently outside. They were about three fourths of the way home when the lady who pushed the cart down the asile offered them all hot chocolate. They, of course, agreed to buy some and sat there, sipping silently. Finally Sirius decided to talk.
"So what do you guys think about the whole dark arts situation?" he asked.
"I'm scared. I'm scared for my parents, they're muggles you know. And most of the attacks have been on muggles who are parents of wizards, or sisters or cousins..." said Lily, trailing off.
"Well it wouldn't matter if something happened to that sister of yours," said Sirius jokingly, causing Lily to laugh. "But honestly, I think they will be okay. I mean you know when you have one of those feelings that nothing bad is going to happen? That's what I feel now. Your parents will be fine." Sirius was not as sure as he sounded, but he succeded in cheering Lily up a little bit.
"Yeah..." she stated quietly.
"I just wonder when all of this is going to be over. I mean, things like this never happen. Most wizards don't just go around looking for followers and trying to take over the world. And the ones that do try...well the ministry gets to them real fast," said Lauren. Jamie nodded.
"It's scary that he has stood up to the minstry for this long. I mean, there was a witch that tried to gain power when we were first years and she only lasted about a week," said Jamie.
"Well when you think about it, it hasn't been that long," said James. "I mean, since this summer. It hasn't even been a year. They'll catch him, I'm sure of it," said James. Sirius must have realized that he had brought up a bad topic, because he quickly changed the subject.
"So, how about them cannons, eh?" he asked, and the group talked about quidditch until it was time to get off the train.
James' mother and father were waiting at the gate for James and Lily, his father talking to some ministry officials and his mother gossiping as usual. However, a very unusual thing happened when James started to leave Platform 9 and 3/4 through the barrier.
"James darling, where on earth do you think you're going?" asked Mrs. Potter, crossing her arms.
"Home..." said James, as if this were obvious.
"Well the grate is that way, we need to go there if we are going to leave by floo powder," stated Mr. Potter. James gave them a suprised look.
"What do you mean, we're actually leaving by floo powder?" asked James. Since James had been a first year, his father had never allowed him to go anyway but friends' houses by floo powder. He said that only ordinary people arrived in that manner, and they were far from ordinary.
"Well yes we are leaving by floo powder! How else would we go?" asked Mrs. Potter. James rolled his eyes and followed her. He had wanted to say By car, like we've done every other year, but luckily for him he was able to hold his tounge.
"Here you go James, Lily," said Mr. Potter, handing scarlet crystals to Lily and James. They both looked at them with awe, they had used floo powder on many ocassions and it most definatly did not look like scarlet crystals.
"Um, Mr. Potter, what exactly is this?" asked Lily.
"It's a new type of floo powder, extra security. I throw it in and one of the house elves will see us in the fire. Then they haveto ask a password to verify that we are allowed to go in, check a list and then they press a button to let us in. It's top security. Lily, I've made sure that they know you are on the list. James, you may go first and then it is your turn Lily," explained Mr. Potter. James hurried to the fire and threw in the red crystals. The entire grate was suddenly a blurred shadow.
"It's for security reasons Lily. Makes sure that no one else can hear the password," said Mrs. Potter as the grate came back in to vision with James gone. "It's frog legs by the way," Mrs. Potter added in a whisper. Lily stepped forward and threw the crystals into the fire. The fire blazed silver, and a house elf came into view.
"Name?" said the elf in her high, squeaky voice.
"Lily Evans," replied Lily.
"Password?" the elf inquired.
"Frog legs," said Lily. The fire then turned green and Lily stepped through. The spinning sensation was not as terrible as it usually was with floo powder, and Lily landed neatly on an area rug in James' living room with not a spot of soot on her. James smiled at her, and handed her trunk to a house elf that was waiting patiently to take it.
"The new floo powder's really something, isn't it?" asked James.
"Yeah, it's great," replied Lily. She had just noticed the amazing Christmas decorations that the Potters had put up. They were more elaborate than the Hogwarts decorations; holly and mistletoe were strung everywhere. In the corner there was a large Chritmas tree that must have been thirty feet tall, decorated with floating fairy lights. There was a sea of presents under it, and Lily couldn't help gazing at the splendidly decorated room.
"Lily, don't you want to go to your room now?" asked James. Lily nodded, and they made there way up a flight of sprial stairs, through a hallway, down a flight of stairs and then up three more flights
The room that Lily was to be staying in reminded her of the princess' castles in the disney movies. There were long, purple curtains that hung down to the ground, tapestries, a balcony, a queen sized bed complete with a comfortable looking purple comforter and a canopy. James left Lily to unpack her things, a task which she completed in less than ten minutes. From her bed she looked out of the window and saw the snow falling on the beautiful garden in the backyard, and Lily couldn't help but think that this was the place where she was meant to be.
A/N- Well isn't it purdy? I think so. The next chapter is going to be a really long one (James' party, christmas, and new years all squished into one super chapter) and that should bring us pretty much to a few short chapters and (dun dun dun!) Valentine's Day. So stayed tuned, and until then please review.
Disclaimer- It was J.K.R.'s idea! She started it! *pouts like a child*