Lily Chapter 52: Unexpected, a harry potter fanfic

A/N: I am SO SORRY about how late this is! To make a lot of stories short (for a change, lol), we've been very busy and couldn't find the time to rendezvous and write the next chapter. I hope this is worth the wait.

Lily

Chapter 52

"Because," he said, taking a small marble out of his pocket, "It would be all too easy for me to smash this into a million pieces."

Lily watched as Sirius's jaw slowly dropped and he backed away. "What is it? A bomb or something?"

"Uh...let's just say that James really gets around," Sirius muttered.

The man smirked triumphantly, and Lily knew why. He had them trapped; he knew that they wouldn't try to leave without James. Striding casually back to the old desk, he twirled his wand absently. A weak shaft of candlelight glinted off of a little, presumably glass sphere at the end of it. Lily wondered who was inside.

"Wh...why..."

He finished her sentence for her. "Why am I doing this? It's a simple question with a simple answer. Because I can. Now," he hefted a dusty spellbook out and opened to the middle. "What do you think? Corpus Mendillius, the Pharaoh's Curse? An extra leg growing out of your head never fails as a conversation object, you know...Or how about-"

He was cut off by a sudden shrill cheer. "Yahoooooooooooooo!!!! I'M FREEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!" The glass ball at the end of his wand had taken on a bright white glow, then flown across the room, ricocheted off a half dozen mirrors, and landed, hovering, in front of Lily's nose. She now saw that it was a cloudy, light blue color with tiny neon lights dancing around inside of it. Whatever the thing
was, it gave off the same amount of energy as a three-year-old boy who's been cooped up in the house all day because it's been raining. It didn't have a mouth, but all the same, it was shrieking at the top of its nonexistent lungs, "I'm free, I'm free, nyeh nyeh nyeh nyeh! I got off that stupid stick of yours, and now I'm free! Nyeh nyeh nyeh nyeh nyeh nyeh..." Sirius clamped his hands over his ears, trying to block out the irritating cackle.

Their mysterious captor growled dangerously and raised his wand. "Accio Slave!"

The little blue ball floated in lazy circles towards him, complaining poutily. "I'll 'accio' when I'm good and ready, how d'you like that, Mr. High-and-mighty-Mifflewhatever? I'm stretching my legs for once in the past...what's it been, twelve years I've been cooped up on the end of that ruddy wand? Twelve years! Leadin' you around that stupid mirror place - oh, yeah, here it comes, stickin' me onto that bleedin' wand again! Can't catch me sleepin' this time! Hah! I've got more magic in my little finger than you've got in your entire body...er, if I had little fingers." As though in display of his 'magic,' he transformed into a large (and curiously, light blue) phoenix, then into a coffemaker, and finally, into a brilliantly colored parakeet.

"Slave, get back here!" roared the man.

"Slave, get back here! Squaaawwk!"

"I'll have your head for this!"

"I'll have your head for this!" It let loose with a piercing whistle, then dove straight for Lily's and Sirius's wands, which were resting on the desk. Clutching the wands, he flew back towards the two teenagers.

Sirius made a grab for them. "C'mon, hand it over!"

"C'mon, hand it over!"

"You know, you're the most annoying parrot I've ever seen!"

"You know, you're the most annoying parrot I've ever seen!"

"I've got half a mind-"

"Don't flatter yourself...squaksquaksquak."

Lily put a restraining hand on Sirius's arm and whispered into his ear. "I've got an idea. don't say anything." She turned around until she and the parrot were facing the same direction, then checked to see if the wand-tips were pointed towards the figure walking angrily across the room. "Petrificus totalus!" she said, a bit of panic making her voice higher than usual.

"Petrificus totalus!" repeated the bird, with a broad wink. Sparks flew out of both wands, uniting in a sort of sherbert-colored shroud that collided with and froze the formidable man. He fell face-first, his head inches from Lily's foot. It dropped the wands back to their owners.

Sirius gaped at the prone form, then at Lily. "Wow. I guess McGonagall wasn't out of her mind when she moved you up a year."

"Who said she was out of her mind?"

"Er..." he smiled goofily. "Nobody."

Lily rolled her eyes. "Let me guess. James?"

"Marble Boy himself."

The creature cleared his throat. "Y'know, I did play a little part in all this!" He changed into what looked like a Muggle lawyer, complete with a briefcase and an expensive haircut.

"What are you?" She asked, indiscreetly.

Once again, he changed forms. Now he was an old wizard with a very, very long gray beard. He adjusted his large spectacles knowledgably. "Well, I am technically an endangered species, having been debunked by scientific wizards and witches of all classes quite long ago, but in the old days, my appellation would have been 'perificator.'"

Sirius stood silently for about a minute, thinking hard. "So you're the only perificator left in the world."

"Last one I know of."

"What does a perificator do?"

Turning into a gelatinous blob with 'googly eyes,' he glanced snootily at Sirius. "Of course, that's long become a derogatory term. We prefer 'shape-shifter.' And I do have a name, you know. Karilonius Intrilmik Pinrafotat Prelentical Eddiepus Rhadamanthus. Kipper for short, but nobody's called me that in centuries. That fellow down there just calls me 'slave,' which I really can't help but resent; odd little quirk of mine."

As Kipper had been making this rather lengthy speech, Lily was trying to find the least invasive way possible to find the marble that contained James. It helped quite a bit that the man was wearing Muggle clothes underneath his robes. She removed the long cloak and rifled through the pockets until a clear glass ball skittered across the floor. Sirius bent and picked it up, holding it close to his eye and speaking to nobody in particular. "Remus and Peter are never going to believe this."